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Library of The Theological Seminary 


PRINCETON : NEW JERSEY 


<a): 


PRESENTED BY 
The Estate of the 
Rev. John B. Wiedinger 


2 T) 
DL 

















THE SELF AND ITS WORLD 


THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
NEW YORK - BOSTON + CHICAGO + DALLAS 
ATLANTA * SAN FRANCISCO 


MACMILLAN & CO., Luitep 
LONDON + BOMBAY * CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 


THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Lm, 
TORONTO 










Q 
JUN 2 1949 
. SS Cy, 
Leoaioa, sew 


GEORGE ARTHUR’WILSON 


PROFESSOR OF PHILOSOPHY 
SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY 


NEW YORK 
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 


1926 
All rights reserved 


Copyright, 1926, 
By THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. 





Set up and electrotyped. 
Published March, 1926. 


Printed in the United States of America by 
THE FERRIS PRINTING COMPANY, NEW YORK 


PREFACE 


This is an age when everything that has heretofore 
been thought settled is under fire. We must reéxamine 
our profoundest convictions. When difficulties multiply 
and mysteries deepen and the spirit of man is oppressed 
by the weight of all this unintelligible world, philosophy 
is called upon to furnish a doctrine that will answer 
questions and satisfy with meanings. 

The aim of The Self and Its World is to face frankly 
the central problems involved in all our fundamental 
interests—cognitive, zsthetic, moral, religious—and to 
seek a principle of explanation that gives a workable theory 
of life. Philosophy is first distinguished from science; 
for while it builds on science and uses scientific methods, 
it has a different task. Science describes, philosophy 
interprets. 

Assuming with science that the external world is a 
mechanism, we ask, What is this world that we perceive 
through the senses, and how do we come to know it? 
A simple analysis of sense knowledge yields the insight 
that the world of sense perception is throughout and only 
a product of the mind’s creative activity under compulsion 
of an independent source of stimulation. The mechan- 
istic ideal of science is interpreted as meaning an orderly 
universe, a system in which all entities are reduced to 
process. 

The philosopher asks, What is it that proceeds? If 
the world is pure process, nothing remains long enough 
to proceed, and there is no process. [he theory cancels 
itself, unless we can find something that maintains itself 
through time. The realist calls this something an inde- 


v 


vi PREFACE 


pendent world out in space, but cannot tell what it is. 
The absolute idealist says it is experience, but does not 
tell us whose. A better answer is that the reality in the 
outside world is exactly what it appears to be at any 
moment of our apprehension of it. Two factors give it 
permanence for us: one is the continuity of control from 
the source of stimulation, and the other is the persistence 
of our constructive activity. In other words, the outside 
world exists for us only so long as we are interested in it. 
Its reality is value. 

What is this creator of its world, this originator of 
values—the self? It is not an object of observation, 
hence it cannot be identified with anything in time or 
space. Objects are its construction. It is not conscious- 
ness, though being conscious is one of its chief character- 
istics. It is not thought, nor feeling, nor conation. 
These are aspects of its activity; they can be analyzed 
into elements and can vanish into process. The self is 
not the observed but the observer, It is the agent whose 
activity includes our blundering and recovering, our grop- 
ing and finding, our illusions and aspirations—all that 
constitutes experience. Its nature is expressed in its 
world; its measure is all that ever has been, is, or ever 
will be knowable. We are in the making, progressively 
realizing selfhood. Every capacity of the self is poten- 
tially infinite. 

The outside world is defined exhaustively, though not 
in detail, as the self’s response to stimulations from an 
independent source. [hat the world is common to all is 
conclusive evidence that the source is the same for all. 
The assumption that the world is knowable by all is the 
supreme reason for believing that the source is intelligent. 
These are the hard-won fruits of philosophy through the 
centuries. “The conclusions can be ignored, but they 
cannot be logically overthrown. 

From this vantage ground we are able to answer many 
questions of interest. 

What of freedom? In every field of activity the self 


PREFACE vii 


is free, except in so far as its limitations have been proved, 
and even these limitations can be transcended in thought. 
They are movable barriers, as is evidenced by the achieve- 
ments of science. 

What is the ruling principle for the organization of 
values? It is the self. Whatever contributes to its un- 
folding is good, whatever interferes is bad. The self to 
be realized is essentially social, and in willing itself wills 
the good of society as a whole. 

What is the ultimate meaning and justification of the 
objective world of change? The objective world is the 
nexus of conditions for the development of selfhood in 
spiritual beings. Its justification is found in its adapt- 
ability to the training of selves. Its physical expression 
must be renewed, its moral meaning abides. 

What is the relation between human selves and the 
ultimate Power? They are copartners in creating the 
world of experience, The human self wills, and the 
ultimate Power executes. This vital, detailed, and con- 
tinuous codperation with the Power on which we depend 
suggests our inherent capacity to become testy compan- 
ions of the infinite Self. 

Such in barest outline is the argument of the book. 
If the conclusions hold, deductions of transcendent value 
may be drawn as philosophy continues to write the story 
of the inner life, the fascinating drama of the spirit. 

To my colleague, Professor Raymond F. Piper, who 
read the manuscript, my thanks are due for helpful sug- 
gestions, Students through several college generations 
have contributed substantially, by resistance that led to 
clearer exposition and by yielding that encouraged fresh 
effort. My closest associate, cancelling an untold obliga- 
tion, leaves me still more deeply in her debt. 


Syracuse, New York G. A. W. 


Bd 
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CONTENTS 


GENERAL INTRODUCTION 


CHAPTER PAGE 


THE NATURE OF PHILOSOPHY... ..)..... 
II. THE VALIDITY AND VALUE OF PHILOSOPHY.. 19 


BAK CTT 
THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


I, THE DUAL CHARACTER OF OUR SENSE WORLD 27 
II. THE THOUGHT STRUCTURE IN OBJECTS AS 


PRRGEIVED. Wire Maite fattee Riss) bo aiivee sali ig: 37 
Pee OURS LION) OBt VALIDITY iii ui. Shiota |. 72 
iy ore SOURCE OF STIMULATION (0.00 yi: 92 

PART II 


THE WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


I. GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS OF SCIENTIFIC 


10 CO 28) SIR eG OMEN ROR AR eT 106 
II. THE RESULTANT DILEMMA FOR PHILOSOPHY 124 
TIA THETANSWER OR REALISM i) Soe a ak 131 
IV. THE ANSWER OF RECENT IDEALISM ....... 150 


ix 


x CONTENTS 
PART III 
THE WORLD AS VALUE 

, SUMMARY OF ARGUMENT PRO AND CON .... 171 
TES) COGNITIVES VALUES Wine: 2°. 00 aie 184 
LID.) AESTHETIGIVATIUESHNT © Li NRnt ge 0 eee tage 191 
DV | MORAL MALES \Muictel sien Matic a oe 208 
Viel VW RERIGIOUSTVALRUES (tan Renn CON Oa 238 

PART IV 

THEVSEL BIN: DESTWORLD 
I. THE CENTRAL POSITION OF THE SELF IN 

PHITOSOPETY WN pa) CR Ee eee Lis 
II. CONTEMPORARY THEORIES OF THE SELF.... 281 
LIT. THE NATURE OF ‘THE SELF). (On eee 309 
IV. SPECIAL PROBLEMS OF SELFHOOD ........ 353 


THE SELF AND ITS WORLD 








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GENERAL INTRODUCTION 


CHAPTER [| 
‘THE NATURE OF PHILOSOPHY 


Philosophy has often been referred to as the great intel- 
lectual game. It is a game in the same sense that business 
is a game, or mathematics is a game. But the kings and 
queens and pawns are the manifold interests of life, and 
the stake is our all. 

The figure at least serves to call attention to a para- 
mount need. To play the game one must obey the rules. 
From ignorance or ignoring of the rules, philosophy has 
suffered much. A little misunderstanding of the meaning 
or structure of experience, a presumption that seems to be 
a truism and in no need of critical examination will pre- 
cipitate the thinker into a maze of difficulties that mul- 
tiply as he proceeds. He may become an eclectic, culling 
out the best things from competing philosophies, but find 
himself unable to build them into a consistent whole. Or 
he may conclude that what his principles do not explain 
is beyond human insight; but he thereby, on his own 
authority, puts an end to further discussion. Underlying 
most of these difficulties is a misunderstanding of the gen- 
eral character and method of philosophy. It is well, 
therefore, to bring into relief at the outset the distinctively 
philosophical problem and indicate the limits within 
which a solution may be looked for. To this end we 
shall consider the relation of philosophy to common 
sense, to the natural sciences, and to the other types of 
intellectual interest. 

Philosophy is not common sense, though one of its 


l 


2 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 


best brands is called common-sense philosophy. Every 
thinker likes to keep close to common sense when he re- 
flects on the deeper questions of life, for then he feels the 
comforting support of untold multitudes of people. 
Common sense is the distilled wisdom and insight of all 
the past. But just because it consists of inherited beliefs, 
vaguely held and loosely applied, it needs critical study. 
It is never more accurate or consistent than practical life 
requires. It may harbor manifold contradictions and con- 
fusions not suspected till some crisis develops. Such a 
crisis is inevitable as soon as reflective thinking begins. 
Whoever feels the need of a working conception of life as 
a whole proceeds to philosophize. He undertakes to 
clarify popular beliefs and to render them consistent. For 
example, in the light of certain more or less scientific con- 
ceptions common sense is inclined to think that a thing’s 
form and size and hardness belong to it by virtue of its 
being an external object, but that its color and tempera- 
ture and smell originate in the mind. A very little 
scrutiny, however, makes it evident that if color is sub- 
jective, so are form and hardness; or if form and hardness 
are objective, so is color, so in fact are temperature and 
taste and smell, and even, in a sense, beauty and ugliness. 
Correction of the common-sense view is the work of phil- 
osophy. In trying to get rid of lurking inconsistencies, 
the thinker must recast his conceptions. If we cancel the 
distinction between primary and secondary qualities, pop- 
ular beliefs concerning the outside world must be modi- 
fied accordingly. The thinker who is in earnest with his 
task of reconstruction is in spirit, if not in attainment, a 
philosopher. 

From this point of view philosophy may be defined as 
the working over of concepts.1. We see, then, why so 
much that is common sense is taken up into philosophy, 
and why so much good philosophy passes for mere com- 
mon sense. Even the hardiest thinker who dares to seek 
the truth in hair-splitting distinctions and ultra-technical 


1Cf. Herbart, Einleitung in die Philosophie, § 6. 


THE NATURE: OF (PHILOSOPHY 3 


abstractions will eagerly turn to common sense to sub- 
stantiate his conclusions. No one can hope to get a hear- 
ing who persistently offends convictions deeply rooted in 
the popular mind, unless he can invoke still deeper con- 
victions. Inasmuch as the deepest conviction we have as 
human beings is that by observation and thinking we can 
know the world in which we live, any ‘‘working over’ 
necessitated by the laws of consistent thinking can in the 
end be justified at the bar of common sense. 

The relation of philosophy to science is even closer than 
to common sense as ordinarily understood. Nevertheless 
the contrasts between the two are vital. Confusion at this 
point has been the source of endless embarrassment. Had 
their tasks been carefully distinguished and held apart, 
science would have been spared many a barren contro- 
versy and philosophy many a humiliating defeat. Orig- 
inally the term philosophy covered the whole field of 
knowledge; but during the early modern period, the 
sciences, one after another, began to break away and set 
up for themselves. ‘These sciences found that their ever- 
growing body of observed data could best be studied if 
treated as constituting a relatively independent problem. 
Divide and conquer was the dictum of the sciences—a 
dictum amply justified by their success, the glory of mod- 
ern life. “This process of isolating portions of the general 
field for concentrated study has continued to the present 
time with no signs of abatement. If the sciences parcel 
out the territory in this way, what is left as a permanent 
possession for philosophy? May not the time come when 
philosophy will be left an intellectual pauper, free to roam 
at will in ‘‘the wild and tangled forest’’ of life’s inscrut- 
able mysteries and indulge in the “‘unearthly ballet of 
bloodless categories,’’ yet really without a habitat and 
without a task of serious import? Can we find a task that 
will enable philosophy to be scientific without losing its 
character as philosophy? Unless this can be done, phil- 
osophy had better recognize itself as merely premature 
science. ; 


4 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 


Now as the several sciences went their own way, an 
interesting group of left-over questions appeared. These 
had the marks of being extra-scientific, yet were evidently 
legitimate. Some of them seemed to be postulates under- 
lying the sciences, while others had to do with the field 
of knowledge as a whole. Evidently in the midst of this 
group, if anywhere, philosophy must: find its permanent 
home and its garden to cultivate. Not one of the indi- 
vidual sciences is in a position to organize the results of all 
the sciences into a consistent world-view. [his must be 
left to philosophy. In trying to meet the obligation, 
philosophy needs to examine the various assumptions and 
postulates of the several sciences, such as the atomic theory 
of matter, the ultimate adequacy of the mechanistic con- 
ception, and the nature of life. It must also adjust the 
conclusions of one science to those of another, so as to ex- 
hibit them as parts of a harmonious thought structure. 
The scientist may object that the time has not come for 
such an ambitious undertaking, and that when it does 
come, science itself should do the work in its own way. 
But the objection loses much of its force when we con- 
sider certain elementary facts. First, we all want some 
working conception of our experience world taken in its 
entirety. This conception may be tentatively held and 
may lack in definiteness; but limited and imperfect though 
it be, it is a necessity of our intellectual life. Here and 
there outlines of a satisfactory conception can even now 
be traced, and much that science takes to be established 
can find its appropriate place therein. Again, the postu- 
lates of the sciences, whatever their utility, are still postu- 
lates, and need to be considered in the light of all that 
experience reveals as to the nature of the world. With 
every advance that the sciences make in precision, the need 
of a critical handling of their fundamental postulates be- 
comes more pressing. For instance, the atomic theory has 
been justified to the chemist by its great usefulness. Shall 
it stand as the final conception of reality? Or is it to be 
looked upon as a mere organizing principle with but 


POP NA TURE? OF PHIVOSOPHY 5 


limited validity? Now philosophy is not interested to 
prove or disprove the utility of the conception in a par- 
ticular field, for that is a scientific matter; but it examines 
the conception to determine the exact range of its appli- 
cation. Philosophy would ask concerning the atomic 
theory, can it serve as an ultimate principle of explanation 
for the physical universe? Is the cosmic world made up of 
infinitesimally small particles, each independent of all the 
rest? Or if the particles are connected, how much do the 
connections affect their inner nature? We may not think 
of the connections as merely external to the particles, for 
then they would themselves have the status of things, and 
so fail to connect. On the other hand, if the connections 
are really vital to the particles, the particles cannot retain 
a vestige of independence; they become lost as entities in 
the system considered as dynamic throughout. “Thus phil- 
osophy might reason that the universe is not atomic in 
structure, except for those who refuse to think the issue 
through to the end. 

The sciences may ignore this conclusion; they are not 
concerned with the issue raised. “They are satisfied when 
they discover a principle that will enable them to arrange 
and exhibit their findings in the most effective manner. 
Yet the conclusion itself is of profound significance in the 
formulation of a world-view. In so far as philosophy 
endeavors to construct out of the postulates of the sciences 
and the resources of common sense a critical view of the 
world as a whole, it becomes what the ancients called it, 
a science of the sciences—a science of first principles. 

This characterization may stand as a further definition 
of philosophy. But it is not wholly satisfactory, since 
it does not manifestly include what has come to be the 
most significant and pressing extra-scientific problem. “The 
sciences, in separating from the original matrix, naturally 
took with them the prevailing beliefs about reality; but as 
distinctive problems were more sharply defined, these un- 
critical beliefs became a source of embarrassment. ‘They 
seemed necessary, yet in the way. The more elementary 


6 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 


sciences, like physics and chemistry, soon undertook to re- 
define the scientific problem without reference to these in- 
herited beliefs. “Chis effort marked a distinct advance in 
insight; it set the sciences free. “Their real objective was 
seen to be an understanding of the order of changes that 
take place in nature. All the observations and experi- 
ments, all the analyses, all the instruments of precision, all 
the generalizations have as their sole end the formulation 
of the laws of coexistence and change. ‘This sweeping 
conclusion is not even now fully understood and accepted 
by all scientific men, but it is fast becoming a common- 
place among them. It was forced upon them by the actual 
difficulties encountered in research. Physics and chemistry 
might assume the reality of matter, but had to confess that 
its nature was an inscrutable mystery. ‘The biological 
sciences might assume the reality of a principle of life, yet 
could give no account of it as an actual existence distinct 
from vital phenomena. All that these sciences could do 
was to tell how matter and life acted. The assumption 
that there are realities in nature is, then, extra-scientific, yet 
it is made by everybody, whether scientist or not. Phil- 
osophy must face the issue. Is the world a mere nexus of 
activities, or is it a world of substantial things? If a 
world of things, what are they in their origin and nature? 
What sustains them, and what are we as distinguished’ 
from them? ‘These questions are strictly philosophical, 
and science has no way of dealing with them. All other 
issues may be studied as problems in science; these lie out- 
side its domain. “They constitute the supreme object of 
interest for philosophy. Our completed definition, then 
will be that philosophy is a study of reality as such. 

But the man of science will doubtless ask, Is the prob- 
lem of reality a legitimate one? If it lies beyond the reach 
of the sciences, is it not beyond human ken? ‘The variety 
of solutions possible to the problem and the lack of agree- 
ment among philosophers as to which is the right solution 
suggest the hopelessness of the undertaking. Should we 
not, then, recognize our limitations as human beings, ac- 


THE NATURE OF PHILOSOPHY v4 


cept as valid the universal belief that the outside world is 
real, cease trying to tell in what sense it seems to be real, 
and busy ourselves rather with the problems that we have 
some prospect of solving? ‘The mystery of existence is 
inscrutable. Thus reasons the objector, who, whether 
scientist or not, insists on limiting intellectual interests to 
what can be seen and described. When such a man enters 
the field of philosophy, carrying his sceptical prejudices 
with him, he is known as a positivist or agnostic. An 
obstinate attitude deserves a name even though it is only 
a persistence in keeping a door to insight closed. The 
sceptical tendency can best be overcome by proving the 
success of philosophy in meeting the issues involved. “The 
lack of agreement among philosophers will be dealt with 
in due time. 

The important point at present is that the nature of 
reality is a distinctively philosophical problem. When we 
ask how a thing acts, we turn to science; but when’ we 
ask what a thing is, philosophy alone can answer. So 
many and serious are the aberrations resulting from a 
failure to recognize the distinctions here indicated between 
science and philosophy that a further word on the subject 
seems desirable, even at the risk of some repetition. The 
distinction may be considered as involving a twofold con- 
trast—a contrast in aim and in method. 

First, science aims at prevision and control. It seeks 
such an insight into nature’s processes as will enable men 
to forecast, and, where desirable, to modify the course of 
events. In preparing man to meet the future intelligently 
and make nature minister to his needs, science is thor- 
oughly practical. It has to do primarily with adjust- 
ments to environment. ‘The better to accomplish this 
work, each science devotes itself to a limited field, either 
some clearly defined aspect of the world, or else a problem 
involving a definite group of objects. In contrast with 
the practical interests of science, philosophy aims at theo- 
retical insight. It is not concerned to increase our control 
over nature’s laws, but would satisfy the intellectual de- 


8 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 


mand for completeness, concreteness, system, and har- 
mony. The completeness aimed at in the study of experi- 
ence is not a mere matter of comprehensiveness or exten- 
sion, such as might be reached if all the sciences were fitted 
into a general scheme. While it involves this, to be sure, 
it involves much more. In seeking the real, philosophy 
must find a place in its world-conception for every dis- 
tinguishable aspect of experience. All that the separate 
sciences ignore as irrelevant to their purposes must be in- 
cluded in the purview of philosophy. The reason for 
this is evident. ‘The existent real cannot be other or less 
than the entire fact in all its complexity. No simplified 
substitute, however useful in a practical way, will an- 
swer. Anything less than the exhaustively complete 
would be an abstraction, not reality. But what we have 
just said does not mean that philosophy attempts the 
impossible task of cataloguing the infinite items of chang- 
ing experience. It undertakes the more modest task of 
formulating a conception of the world that will provide 
for every infinitesimal detail. It must do this because it 
seeks the ultimately concrete. 

Science, being practical, can afford to ignore. It would 
be overwhelmed if it undertook to carry all the trivial 
items of experience into its problems. Not even a begin- 
ning could be made in the way of research. A scientific 
problem arises in the study of nature only as a result of 
analysis and selection in accordance with some particular 
purpose in the mind of the investigator. While the selec- 
tion is evident in the most elementary phases of sense ex- 
perience recognized by science, it is still more evident in 
the weaving of the intellectual fabric we call the scientific 
view of the world. This fabric is throughout a tissue of 
concepts, laws, theories. We call it ‘‘nature,’’ ‘“‘the uni- 
verse,’ “‘the cosmos’; but, strictly speaking, it is an ab- 
straction. The chief concern of science in building up this 
world is to discover uniformities in nature. These are 
found in the relationships between events and their condi- 
tions. When, for instance, it is noted that celestial mo- 


THE NATURE OF PHILOSOPHY 9 


tions may be viewed as a resultant of two opposing tend- 
encies, we need only to determine the mass of two or more 
bodies and their distance one from another to see that their 
relative motions conform to a law, the law of gravitation. 
This law does not describe a body, but shows its rela- 
tion to other bodies in such a formal and universal way 
that from appropriate data the position of bodies may be 
calculated for periods extending into the distant future. 
The law of gravitation thus takes its place as fundamental 
in a scientific world-view. All the other features of such 
a view are equally relational in character. 

Philosophy, on the other hand, aiming to ascertain the 
nature of reality as it is, must transcend the mere formu- 
lation of guiding universals and reach if possible the in- 
dividual in its uniqueness. ‘The concrete is always indi- 
vidual, and hence necessarily unique. This statement is to 
be so construed as not to prejudge the question whether 
the concrete is not also a universal of a certain kind. An 
influential school of present-day thinkers contends that 
the real is the concrete universal. But at this stage of our 
discussion the argument will be less ambiguous and more 
easily understood if we stress the individuality of the real. 
To find and characterize the individual may require a long 
and arduous study of such abstractions as unity, variety, 
relation, change, quality. In fact, philosophy is so largely 
engaged with such considerations that it is likely to seem 
to the lay mind forbiddingly abstract, and quite divorced 
from the common interests of life. But that is only be- 
cause it undertakes to be uncompromisingly thorough in 
the search for the reality that constitutes our everyday 
experience. As with the realities in experience, so with 
their relations to one another. No two relations can 
be exactly alike, nor can any relation continue without 
change. Hence the uniformities that constitute the struc- 
ture of the scientific view must be reinterpreted by philos- 
ophy so as to do justice to the unique features of the 
individual’s world. 

This thought may be restated in a somewhat different 


10 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 


way, and its decisive importance thereby emphasized. We 
sustain two distinguishable attitudes toward our sense 
world. When interested in manipulating it, we treat it 
as detached from us; we look upon it as an observer would. 
We stand off, as it were, and view it from the outside. 
This is evidently an acquired attitude or point of view, 
Originating in our practical needs. One result of this 
objective attitude is that all of life is reduced to the same 
level. ‘The only existences are mere objects; nowhere can 
a subject or self be found. What may inadvertently be 
taken for selves must be treated as objects, susceptive of 
analysis and reconstruction like all other objects. In 
short, when we view our own experience world as it might 
appear to another person looking on, we eliminate our- 
selves entirely. But from this sophisticated attitude we 
may shift and view the external world as our own experi- 
ence. ‘Io do this we must for the time being set aside 
practical interests. As soon as we realize that the sense 
world is primarily our own experience, a fairly definite 
line of cleavage appears between the world we experience 
and ourselves as having the experience. 

Now science, as concerned with the practical mastery of 
nature, holds steadfastly the objective or impersonal point 
of view. It analyzes and describes as if analysis alone 
yielded trustworthy knowledge. ‘The self, therefore, does 
not come within its scope except as an object, grist for its 
intellectual mill. In contrast, philosophy, having only 
theoretical interests and seeking to satisfy the desire to 
know the real as such, must recognize the primacy of the 
subjective or epistemic point of view. When the phil- 
osophical issue is raised, the self and its world become the 
two poles of interest. Philosophy thus views the world 
from within and therefore sees it in its concrete reality. 
While science as objective is necessarily abstract, phil- 
osophy is concrete to the limit of its power. It refuses to 
recognize the objects of the outside world as concrete, — 
though they may seem so to the observer, but insists on 
taking account of the relations that determine the nature 


Toe NAb URE OF PHITOSOPEHY 11 


of the object. Thus the reference of the object to the 
self as knower becomes supremely significant. The dis- 
tinction between the knower and the objective world is, 
however, a distinction within experience and does not in- 
volve a dualism of realities. The philosophical conten- 
tion that the objective world is experience and is therefore 
phenomenal throughout evidently holds the answer to 
vitally important questions. Whenever it is ignored, as 
it sometimes is even by philosophers themselves, philos- 
ophy loses its bearings and becomes quasi scientific. Many 
realistic thinkers take exception to the phenomenality of 
the objective world. They maintain that this doctrine 
prejudges all the main points of controversy in philosophy. 
They are right; but there is no help for it, unless they can 
furnish a better explanation. 

Secondly, philosophical method differs from the method 
of the sciences principally in the greater use it makes of 
what is called the critical regress. “The sciences are largely 
occupied with experimentation and such use of statistical 
material as furnishes a close approximation to experiment. 
In this they are free to make any assumption that may 
promote the attainment and organization of results. Thus 
chemistry assumes the molecular structure of matter; 
physics, the presence of ether; biology, the vital energy 
or principle of life. So long as such assumptions serve their 
purpose within the several sciences, they are accepted with- 
out further criticism. Only when they become inadequate 
or require too great a complexity of supporting assump- 
tions are they called in question and more desirable prin- 
ciples sought in their place. “This happens occasionally, 
but not often. For instance, the discovery of radio-ac- 
tivity a few decades ago led to various readjustments of 
theory in certain of the elementary sciences. It forced a 
new reckoning, and thus marked an epoch. So it was 
with the work of Copernicus and of Darwin. In each 
case the new doctrine had to prove its greater explaining 
power, its greater simplicity and adequacy, before it could 
supplant the old. When once accepted, the new theory 


V2 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 


transformed the entire scientific structure. What each of 
the sciences is called upon to do whenever a discovery is 
made that affects its own basic principles and assumptions, 
philosophy undertakes to do for the whole field of knowl- 
edge. In the quest for an all-explaining principle, it tries 
out the principles that have proved serviceable in scientific 
research. Whatever has succeeded in a limited field has 
prima facie claim to an extended application. But these 
scientific principles reveal their inadequacy when applied 
to the whole range of experience. ‘To take an illustration 
already used, the corpuscular theory of matter is sum- 
marily set aside by the exigencies of system. If all objects 
that compose our universe are in thoroughgoing inter- 
action, then all is process and no atoms or corpuscles, how- 
ever small, can escape the all-engulfing flux. “To harmo- 
nize our working principles of explanation or organization 
is the very life of philosophy. Because the philosopher 
is always seeking the deeper harmonies, he must ask ques- 
tions and make distinctions that may have little meaning 
for the scientist. His critical task is never done. Every 
new insight means reconstruction. Results are held ten- 
tatively in view of possible new findings. This persist- 
ence in returning to first principles and beginning anew 
the critical construction gives the appearance of treadmill 
movement. The old problems apparently recur with 
wearying regularity. This impression is wrong, since no 
problem ever recurs with exactly the same old meaning; 
yet harking back to beginnings is characteristic of philo- 
sophical method. ‘The task, then, that we set for our- 
selves is to carry forward the critical revision of current 
views to the limit of our ability. The result must stand 
as final—until a keener analysis or a deeper insight dis- 
closes a flaw in our reasoning. 

While at present we are interested in contrasting the 
two points of view or ways of treating experience, we 
should not lose sight of the fact already mentioned, that 
though contrasted, these two modes are strictly comple- 
mentary and essential to each other. ‘The science that 


THE NATURE: OF PHILOSOPHY 13 


persistently maintained the objective point of view would 
finally issue in mathematical formulae, which, while valid 
for the world of objects, could certainly not be identified 
with that world. The elementary physical sciences are 
content to rest in such formulae, because they have ready 
at hand the metaphysical conceptions of popular phil- 
osophy. Thus when they speak of substance, matter, 
force, ether, atom, electricity, they are using intellectual 
interpretations, all of which are metaphysical. That the 
sciences should accept popular metaphysics with very slight 
critical examination is not strange nor reprehensible. So 
long as such conceptions serve the purpose of the sciences 
they justify themselves. This is because the aim of science, 
however theoretical the immediate attitude, is ultimately 
practical. On the other hand, a philosophy that tried to 
ignore the scientific view of the world would hardly merit 
serious consideration. “The subjective method is simply a 
way of studying the objective world and accounting for 
it as knowledge. Philosophy assumes the results of scien- 
tific research, while science uses what it can of current 
philosophical conceptions. What is here said of phil- 
osophy in an abstract way, all that follows will illustrate. 

In summing up we may recognize the broad similari- 
ties as well as the differences. Science and philosophy alike 
use all the resources of intellect and skill to attain the 
truth. Their methods are logical, and their results are 
taken to be established only when they stand against the 
strongest possible assaults. “They study the same world, 
and all that either learns has a significance for the other. 
But science and philosophy ask different questions of 
nature and get appropriate answers. Science is concerned 
with questions of structure and function. Such investi- 
gation makes a strict limitation of each problem necessary 
and requires that the objective point of view be main- 
tained. Philosophy, aiming at insight into the nature of 
the real, must be all-comprehensive in range and must 
consequently view the world from within as the experi- 


14 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 


ence of a self. Science proceeds largely by experimenta- 
tion, philosophy by critical adjustment. 

Having differentiated philosophy from the natural 
sciences, we have now to consider its relations to the other 
types of intellectual effort, such as theology, history, lit- 
erature, and art. 

Philosophy culminates in a theory of the ultimate 
power to which all things in the universe must be referred. 
A given philosophy may issue in the view that this power 
is unknowable, or that it is a material substance, or that 
it is simply the universe considered as a unity, or finally 
that it is an Intelligence working its will in nature’s on- 
goings. When this last conception is reached philosophy 
approximates theology. Yet there is a generally recog- 
nized difference between the two. ‘Theology starts with 
a doctrine of God, a doctrine more or less definitely pre- 
sented in some traditional form (as in the Bible), and 
tries to harmonize it with the science and philosophy of 
the day. Philosophy, on the other hand, starts with the 
world of experience, past and present, and tries to weld 
the entire body of knowledge and theory into a consistent 
whole by clearing up the confusions and straightening out 
the contradictions. Philosophy has no preconceived theory 
and recognizes no authority except accredited experience 
and the laws of correct thinking. "Theology commends 
itself to thoughtful people in so far as it approximates 
the methods and presuppositions of philosophy. On the 
other hand, philosophy seems able to complete itself only 
as it attains to a conception of an intelligent Power as the 
Source of all that exists. If this seeming proves to be 
actuality, then the saying of Hegel must be recognized 
as final insight, that all philosophy issues in a theology. 

The relations of philosophy to history are equally 
intimate and if possible more complicated. Philosophy, 
as the interpretation of experience, must take account of 
the past. We can understand the facts of life only in their 
history. Reflecting on this truth, some thinkers have 
plausibly maintained that the really significant part of 


‘THE NATURE OF PHILOSOPHY 15 


philosophy is its account of human ideals in their gradual 
unfolding. But this view is one-sided; philosophy be- 
comes philosophy only as it transcends the historical and 
becomes throughout critically systematic. Nevertheless 
philosophy profits greatly by a study of what man has 
thought and done in the past. Old systems though out- 
grown, old guesses at the riddle of existence, old contro- 
versies over real difficulties in the thought world, all help 
to deepen insight and make interpretations more adequate. 

But the contrast between the historical and the critical 
study of life should not cause us to minify the similarities 
of aim and content. Both history and philosophy deal 
with the world as a human world to be interpreted in 
terms of human interest; both emphasize the inner mean- 
ings as contrasted with external description. Though 
history aims to be strictly objective in its treatment of 
events and institutions, it succeeds as history only in so far 
as it allows itself to be dominated by subjective considera- 
tions. The historian may go to great pains to ascertain 
the exact facts and to set them forth without prejudice, 
yet he inevitably selects his facts and arranges them with 
reference to his idea of their significance. If his conception 
of what is humanly significant in history should be much 
at variance with accepted standards of value, he would 
have to face the charge of inaccuracy, prejudice, superfici- 
ality, and could escape only by vindicating his position. 
Thus the present rules the past in so far as the past is 
recorded in history. Since historical perspectives vary with 
interest, there can be as many different interpretations of a 
given past as there are historians. Facts are artifacts and 
express subjective attitudes. This is no discredit to his- 
tory. It means that we live in a human world where in- 
terests dominate. We can dehumanize it only by ceasing 
to understand it. As history is nothing if not interpreta- 
tion, it is in its measure an illustrative philosophy of life, 
teaching by example. We may go even further than this. 
Since both history and philosophy deal ordinarily with 
individuals (persons as such) as distinguished from gen- 


16 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 


eral concepts and laws, and both alike endeavor to under- 
stand the present and the future by a study of the past, 
and also since both, transcending the natural science con- 
ception of causal connection, must recognize desires, ideals, 
purposes, as grounds of action, we may find much sup- 
port for the statement that history is really philosophy 
in the making.’ 

Literature is related to philosophy much as experimen- 
tation is related to general theories in science. At least 
this is true as regards the literary classics. hey are pene- 
trative analyses of human nature and the motives that 
drive men to action. Like experimentation they imply 
theoretical construction. Inherent in every classic is a view 
of life and hence a philosophy. The larger conception 
may not be consciously before the writer at the time, but 
it controls his selection of theme, development of plot, 
and shaping of the dénouement. ‘To bring out the under- 
lying philosophy of a literary masterpiece is to reveal, so 
far as its thought content is concerned, its permanent 
significance and value. 

But literature differs from philosophy not only as be- 
ing the portrayal of a particular situation, rather than a 
logically coherent view of life as a whole, but also as be- 
ing picturesque and emotionally appealing. Philosophy 
has no right to be picturesque, except for the sake of 
illustration. A picture is ambiguous. Philosophy, hav- 
ing to satisfy logical requirements, must avoid ambiguity 
as a surgeon avoids infection. The helpfulness of liter- 
ature lies very largely in its analogical or metaphorical 
interpretations of experience; the helpfulness of philos- 
ophy, in its ability to solve life’s major problems. 

The wisdom literature of the world is compressed phil- 
osophy, embodying in vivid and arresting form the pro- 
foundest reflections of mankind. It testifies to the univer- 
sality of the philosophical impulse and stands out as a 

2For an illuminating discussion of the theme, see ‘“‘What is His- 


tory?’’ by J. W. Swain, Journal of Philosophy, 1923, pp. 281-289, 
309-327, 337-349. 


THE NATURE’ OF’ PHILOSOPHY 17 


perpetual appeal to the thinker to weld its varying ex- 
pressions together and bring them into harmony with the 
findings of science. In so far as this is done, we have a 
philosophy. Good literature then is, generally speaking, 
good philosophy as far as it goes, though good philosophy 
may not be good literature. 

Philosophy is related to art quite as closely as to litera- 
ture. The connection though profound is indirect. Art 
as the expression of beauty appeals to a fundamental need 
of human nature. No philosophy can afford to ignore 
it. Beauty exemplified is both a datum and an ideal for 
philosophy. It is something to be taken into account as 
giving content to life; it also suggests the goal to be 
reached in the elaboration of a philosophical system. As 
an ideal, beauty in philosophy concerns the logical form 
and structure (the ‘architectonic,’ as Kant called it). 
Philosophy must observe the law of intellectual perspec- 
tive and proportion. It must have such clearness and 
definiteness, as well as depth and comprehensiveness, as 
will satisfy the mind in all its demands; to this extent it 
must have beauty, must be a work of art. But its art is 
of the intellectual type. If it reaches the emotions, it must 
be largely through its convincing power, its illumination 
of life’s problems. 

The relation of philosophy to the types of intellectual 
life other than the natural sciences may be summarized 
thus. Philosophy is not theology, yet it must give a satis- 
factory account of the racial God-consciousness and the 
phenomena of the religious life. It is not history in the 
generally accepted meaning of the term, yet it compre- 
hends all the past, even that which does not get expressed 
in any histories. An interpretative account of the struggle 
for intellectual emancipation and enlightenment is pri- 
marily a history of philosophy, and as such furnishes an 
exhaustless reserve of suggestive material for systematic 
treatment. Literature and philosophy are also closely 
afhliated. Literary masterpieces are charged with philo- 
sophical significance. Especially is this true of the wis- 


18 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 


dom literature of the race. Art expresses beauty in sensuous 
form; like literature it appeals to the emotions. Phil- 
osophy aims to satisfy intellectual demands. At its best 
it has the element of beauty, but it is a beauty of harmony 
and organization of our beliefs. Thus philosophy claims 
kinship with all the intellectual interests. It undertakes 
to utilize them in constructing such a view of our experi- 
ence world as will bear the sharpest scrutiny. It must, 


therefore, stand as our deepest insight into the meaning 
of life. 


CHAPTER II 
THE VALIDITY AND VALUE OF PHILOSOPHY 


The validity of philosophy has been called in question 
because of its apparent unprogressiveness. The charge 
seems to be supported by two considerations. Superficially 
the issues that occupy the attention of present-day thinkers 
resemble those that were discussed by the ancient Greeks. 
One cycle of abortive solutions of the same problems ap- 
pears to follow another with monotonous regularity. 
Seeing so many failures, the onlooker may conclude that 
these problems are beyond the powers of human intelli- 
gence. [This conclusion is drawn the more readily by 
those who, trained in the strict, scientific way of thinking, 
find it difficult to shift to the philosophical. Again the 
charge of futility is apparently supported by the oft- 
observed fact that each philosophical system is the work 
of an individual mind and bears the marks of its origin. 
The personal element is inherent and cannot be eliminated. 
Unlike science, which is impersonal and objective, arriv- 
ing at conclusions that all can test and must accept, phil- 
osophy apparently wastes itself in vainly attacking and 
defending contradictory conclusions with no decisive means 
of settling the issue between them. 

Let us consider first the charge of monotony and lack of 
progress. It is natural that in philosophy each thinker 
should want to begin at the very beginning, so as to bur- 
den himself with as few presuppositions as possible. His 
aim is to make a fresh analysis of experience and try to 
carry the analysis a step further than any of his predeces- 
sors. If he can discover a new principle of explanation or 


19 


20 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 


clarify one already employed, he may lay the foundation 
of a more satisfactory world-view. This continuously 
renewed effort to find, if possible, firmer ground on which 
to build is the essence of philosophy. It does not mean 
monotony where there is real thinking. From age to age 
the issues change, though the same terms may be used 
to designate them. Every time a basic conception, such 
as subject, object, consciousness, cause, is a little more 
sharply defined, our whole world-view feels the effect. 
Nothing can remain the same, though the poverty of lan- 
guage makes it necessary to retain the old terminology. 
The sameness is like the sameness of a landscape viewed 
casually and then again and again with greater attention, 
or like space relations that are the subject of more and 
more thoroughgoing mathematical treatment. __ 

The second criticism, pointing to the bewildering va- 
riety and lack of consensus, is rather more difficult to meet, 
though to the careful thinker it does not weigh heavily. 
The personal element is present in philosophy as in all 
thinking. Science, with its problems of measurement, tries 
to be strictly impersonal, and succeeds to a remarkable de- 
gree by employing devices to nullify the inaccuracies of 
individual workers. Philosophy can also neutralize the 
eccentricities of individuals by methods of its own; but it 
can never get rid of the personal element. Evidently the 
term personal does not mean the same for philosophy as 
it does for science. For the latter it is synonymous with 
troublesome inaccuracy, for the former it is an inherent 
quality, all-pervasive and decisive of ultimate issues. The 
task of philosophy is not measurement, except to a limited 
extent, but rather interpretation; and all interpretation is 
personal, that is, it is the individual’s own estimate of 
significance in any given experience. As soon as we ask 
for meanings, we enter the personal sphere, we move in a 
world that is human throughout. The problem for phil- 
osophy is to transcend the caprice and narrowness of the 
individual thinker, and reach that which is essential and 
universal. 


VALIDITY AND VALUE OF PHILOSOPHY 21 


No doubt each thinker brings to the consideration of 
his problems a bias of interests and a personal attitude and 
capacity that are sure to affect somewhat his conclusions. 
A man’s philosophy reveals what sort of man he is, what 
his dominant interests are, and what is the limit of his 
capacity to interpret his own experiences. Thus a scien- 
tist becoming interested in philosophical issues would nat- 
urally assume an objective attitude toward nature and 
life. What he could see with either his physical or his 
mind’s eye would especially appeal to him. He would 
want to visualize his explanations. He would be eager 
to find evidence of orderliness, interdependence, and de- 
velopment in nature. If mathematically inclined, he would 
look upon nature as a sort of concrete logic, a geometry, 
an infinite problem in the mathematics of number and 
relations. If he cared more for the inductive and experi- 
mental sciences, he would dwell on the variety and beauty 
of nature, yet still would hold that a philosophical view 
of the world must be rigidly systematic. He would be 
primarily concerned with adjusting the assumptions of 
the various sciences, and at the same time he would nat- 
urally be shy of affirmations that seemed to go beyond 
inferences yielded by the analysis of scientific data. The 
logical drift would be toward a view of the world as an 
absolute system. Yet the philosopher in him would 
prompt him to retain at least the notion of substance as 
the real. He would retain it, however, with increasing 
difficulty. As he turned upon it his intellectual searchlight, 
it would shrivel up and become scarcely more than a con- 
viction that something is real in the system, he knows not 
what. Scientists then who turn philosophers show a pre- 
disposition to an agnostic attitude toward the central prob- 
lem of philosophy. 

In partial contrast, the religionist who takes to phil- 
osophy finds it easy to believe what helps to establish his 
faith, and difficult to do justice to any conclusions that 
seem to threaten it. He is almost sure to oppose certain 
types of thought as being unworthy or unfruitful or in- 


22 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 


adequate or meaningless or simply atheistic; while at the 
same time he will be lured on to accept, often without 
sufficiently critical sifting, conclusions that superficially 
seem to help establish cherished beliefs. He may thus 
gather into his world-view much that shows bias and can- 
not withstand critical attack. “To avoid the bias, he may 
elect to follow the lead of the scientist who would make 
philosophy ‘“‘scientific.’” He would be likely to reach a 
conception of reality as substance concerning which we 
can know nothing, and would then become a theological 
agnostic or, what is practically the same, a pantheist. 

Again when an artist or man of letters tries his hand at 
philosophical problems, he brings to his study a distinctive 
equipment and bent of nature. The universe presents it- 
self to him as the arena where values are realized or de- 
stroyed. If strongly emotional, he may take a pessimistic 
view of life, see nature red in tooth and claw, man a sport 
of his environment, the future dark with forebodings of 
the tragic end; or he may turn meliorist, see in the dis- 
covery and appreciation of natural beauty the secret of a 
satisf ying existence, and catch the inspiration of fellowship 
in service. Whatever his general scheme of things, his 
personal and esthetic interests are sure to color his entire 
intellectual universe. 

What is true of these types of intellectual interest and 
consequent bias is true of every individual who finds his 
way into philosophical territory. The business man, the 
philanthropist, the lawyer, the physician, each has his own 
personal equation which consciously or unconsciously 
affects his choice of experience material out of which to 
build his world-view. But such warpings, though com- 
mon in the history of thought, are not really necessary. 
Each partial view contains a measure of truth, and if 
understood in its limitations, may contribute its share to 
a more adequate synthesis. Yet the personal equation will, 
perhaps, never be entirely got rid of. Philosophical in- 
sight is bound to vary through the whole gamut of human 
capacity. to think and appreciate. There is no denying that 


VALIDITY AND VALUE OF PHILOSOPHY 23 


this means bewildering diversity. But it has its advantages. 
From such richness and variety of philosophical construc- 
tion and insight, the alert student can increase his re- 
sources. Ihe main task is to find a principle that will 
organize all the affirmative elements into a coherent whole. 
A philosophy is to be measured by its ability to take up 
into itself the truth in other types of thought, and to give 
at the same time convincing reasons why the others fail. 
The problem is primarily one of inclusiveness. Only that 
philosophy will stand the test which can logically assimi- 
late the truth in other systems and explain their error. 
Though the task has already commanded the best thought 
of a thousand generations and is certain to be a center of 
interest for a long time to come, we, the heirs of the ages, 
may enter into our inheritance, gather up into an outline 
view all that constitutes our experience world, and feel 
assured that some of life’s most vital issues can even now 
be settled for us. “This assurance seems warranted as we 
discover that since philosophy must comprehend a pro- 
gressive richness and variety of experience, its principles of 
explanation must be susceptible of unlimited growth in 
ideational content. If we can find such principles we may 
accept them as final. 

If this goal were attained, what would be its value? 
If it were not attained in full measure but continuously 
striven for, would the striving and the partial success have 
a value commensurate with the centuries of labor involved? 
In attempting to answer these questions, we may treat 
them as one rather than two, because if the principle of 
growth as just explained is valid, all philosophies are final 
for those who hold them, but remain so only till further 
reflection reveals a need of revision. An ultimately final 
philosophy is in the nature of the case impossible to any 
except an infinite intelligence, while a humanly final 
philosophy is attained by every thinker in so far and for 
so long as he is satisfied. : 

The values of. philosophy are many. Perhaps the 
greatest is the recognition it brings of the place of values 


24 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 


in our lives and our experience world. From this point 
of view science is the creator of the problem that philos- 
ophy seeks to solve. That is, the scientific attempt to be 
accurate and fruitful in the study of nature leads to the 
adoption of a method that not merely ignores values but 
undertakes to exclude them entirely as factors. Science 
would be objective and impersonal. But this attitude is 
manifestly a means to an end, and the end is always a 
value. We obtain values by ignoring them. This is an- 
other way of saying that science succeeds by letting nature 
speak for itself without the intrusion of subjective con- 
siderations. “True, we evaluate the results, yet the values 
seem to be read into what, as results, did not contain them. 
This impression gives rise to the notion that nature in 
itself is without value. If the scientific attitude were con- 
sistently maintained, the world would appear as a mean- 
ingless drift of dead matter, an infinite permutation of 
physical elements. We as selves would be resolved into 
aspects of the flux, or by-products of the process. This 
view is intolerable, of course. “That it seems so foreign 
to us is evidence, however, not of its inconsistency, but 
rather of our incapacity to hold ourselves for long to a 
strictly scientific view of the world. The recovery from 
the abstract view of science and the bringing back of 
value into our experience constitute the movement toward 
philosophy. This restoration is vital to our well-being. 
Science and philosophy are so closely related that as the 
one increases in significance the other is similarly affected. 
Hence no one should be more insistent upon the impor- 
tance of philosophy than the thoroughgoing scientist. On 
the other hand, the philosopher who does not know and 
appreciate science does little more than beat the air. 
Philosophy gives values their rightful place in the con- 
crete reality of experience. Life not only becomes an 
ordered whole of interrelated values, but the self as the 
evaluator is seen to hold the central place in its world. 
Thus all for which science exists is conserved, all is re- 
lated to the self from which the organic unity is derived, 


VALIDITY AND VALUE OF PHILOSOPHY 25 


This task of integrating experience according to the ideal 
of value makes philosophy the most practical of all pur- 
suits. To the layman it may seem abstract and far re- 
moved from the details of life, but it is pursuing the su- 
preme value of complete orientation in the world of values. 
The nature of such a quest explains why philosophy has 
so much to say about the basic concepts of the moral and 
religious life. The organization of experience in its con- 
crete manifoldness and variety is not possible without 
thorough consideration of both the relation of values to 
one another and their relation to the ultimate Source of 
existence. This means that philosophy normally issues in 
a doctrine of God and man and destiny. 

But a false philosophy may be harmful. We need only 
neglect some of the less obvious but vitally significant 
factors of experience and correspondingly emphasize others 
to get a distorted view of life. The mischief to the indi- 
vidual holding such views may not be great. His early 
training, social environment, and native moral bent may 
prevent his defective philosophy from coming to full ex- 
pression in life and conduct. But if his philosophy is 
adopted by any considerable number of people, so that the 
hidden logic works itself out, the evil effects may be serious 
and far-reaching. Thus let a people adopt a materialistic 
view of life—a view apparently close to common sense— 
and sooner or later all that gives life its unity, meaning, 
and drive eventually suffers eclipse. A defective philosophy 
works in the social body like a subtle contagion. It may 
appear to the casual observer as insignificant as would the 
germs of a dread disease, and may be quite as fatal in 
its way. 

Yet any conception of our experience world that we 
may adopt becomes so inwrought into our intellectual life 
that we are apt to cling to it tenaciously even after its 
inadequacy is glaringly evident. Force of habit, mental 
indolence, and a host of minor prejudices come to its 
support. Hence we often find the anomaly of highly 
trained minds refusing to consider in a critical way the 


26 GENERAL INTRODUCTION 


foundation questions of life, lest their working theory of 
the world be overthrown. After a man becomes preoccu- 
pied with specific tasks and interests, he has little time for 
the arduous intellectual toil of examining the fundamental 
assumptions of life. The moral of that is, we should 
work through the problems of a world-view before prac- 
tical exigencies cut us off from constructive philosophical 
thinking. 

Just because so many defective thought-systems find 
lodgment in society and maintain themselves in practical 
competition with one another, the conclusion has been 
hastily drawn that the value of philosophy is almost 
wholly negative. Philosophy may forsooth clear away the 
crude theories, superstitions, and confusions of ordinary 
thinking, but it may not aspire to any measure of finality 
as a positive world-view. Such an attitude indicates only 
mental weariness. Logic and reason are on the side of posi- 
tive construction. All criticism of a faulty conception is 
based on the authority of something we hold to be true. 

With this minimum accepted, we can proceed by careful 
reconstruction to an outline which, so far as we are able 
to see, comprehends all experiences and provides for all 
values of life. If at any time an enlarging experience or 
a more penetrative insight should demand a revision in 
order to admit the new truth, this could be accomplished 
without serious intellectual disturbance if our ground 
principles provide for such growth. 

The magnitude of the task should not deter us. Nor 
should we be affrighted by the assaults from every quarter, 
nor depressed by the apparent lack of unanimity among 
thinkers even of the same general outlook. If our phil- 
osophy is adequate, it can stand against every criticism. 
And only persistent and trenchant criticism can reveal its 
adequacy. If adequate, it can take over all that is true in 
opposing systems and fit this logically into a compre- 
hensive view. 


PART 1 
THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


CHAPTER I 
THE DUAL CHARACTER OF OUR SENSE WORLD 


In considering the world of sense perception we shall 
need to assume on the part of the reader an elementary 
knowledge of logic and psychology. These subjects are 
basic for philosophy, as for the sciences. But philosophy 
will have occasion to deal critically with some of their 
conclusions. The one great assumption which philosophy 
itself must make and which cannot be called in question 
is that in the end reason can justify itself; in other words, 
the world, being knowable, must have a rational structure. 
The following discussion will show what this means. 

At the beginning of our study we may note a distinc- 
tion universally made between the physical world, vast in 
extent and complexity, and our knowledge of it. This 
distinction will eventually constitute one of our most per- 
plexing problems. Whatever the physical world may be 
apart from our knowledge, one thing must be granted, 
our knowledge of it is the world itself in so far as we know 
it. We are apt to lose sight of this obvious fact when we 
consider how little of the real world we encompass in any 
one act of perception and how often our apprehension of 
it is inaccurate. At present we are interested only in the 
world as known and we ask, By what means do we get 
this knowledge? 

The easy answer to this question is that knowledge 
comes through the senses. One who gave this answer 
would of course grant that not all sense notions are true. 
He would recognize that sense material should be tested 
in appropriate ways, that observations should be made 


pA 


28 THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


with care, that prejudice should not be allowed to color 
or modify what the senses give. Yet he would contend 
that the senses alone do the revealing, and that all knowl- 
edge is thus sensuous in character. This answer, though 
having a measure of truth, is far from being so simple as 
it seems. If it were adequate as it stands, or were all we 
could know, a philosophical view of the world might be 
a very easy matter—or else an impossibility. Difficulties 
emerge as soon as we try to clear the conception of am- 
biguities and to understand just what it means. They 
swarm from the side of the object as well as from that of 
the observing self. 

What do we mean by the senses? As physical they 
are a part of the external world and involve the very 
issues raised. If we mean only that the senses are media 
or channels by which objects come into relation to the 
mind, we have said very little. At best we have indicated 
that there are steps intervening between the object and the 
brain cortex. ‘This description has the advantage of being 
picturable, and adjustable to the rest of what we may 
know in the same way about the objective world. For 
the sense of sight we can set forth in imagination an 
ether that carries to the eye the light waves (if indeed 
light on its physical side is an ethereal phenomenon), and 
then we can follow the progress through the fluids of 
the eye to the rods and cones and thence along the optic 
nerve to the brain cortex. We may be fairly sure that 
the impulse from the object, on passing from the ether 
to the other media, changes its character considerably. 
What it becomes by the time it reaches the occipital lobes, 
we cannot know from direct observation. But even for 
the imagination it must be some form of motion and not 
the object. The physical series stops with the cortex and 
nowhere along the line of media have we anything but 
motion, while the object persistently remains out in space. 
Nevertheless, in the act of perception the object stands 
before us as apprehended. 


DUAL? CHARAGDERS OF SENSEOWORLD | 29 


How does the visual object come to be there for the 
observer? It is not on the retina; it may be some distance 
away. It seems large when near by and becomes actually 
smaller to vision as it recedes. We have ways of con- 
vincing ourselves that as a matter of fact it remains the 
same size whether far or near. One might ask with the 
psychologist, What is the actual size of the object? and 
get the psychologist’s answer that its actual size is its 
apparent size when at a distance most convenient for 
observation. This answer only accentuates the importance 
of subjective factors in sense perception, but does not 
specify what they are. Vision alone is not enough to 
account for what we see. 

That which is true of the sense of sight is true in 
principle for the other senses. They furnish their char- 
acteristic data out of which the mind builds its sense 
objects. For instance, by the sense of touch we seem to 
come into direct contact with the object and thereby 
determine immediately its size and contour. But is this 
contact immediate? The peripheral nerve endings are 
affected by the resistance of the object and somehow— 
no one knows how, though we can name the process— 
the impulse passes along the nerve to the brain. Only 
then do we have the experience of an object in contact 
with our body. Anywhere along the line of this moving 
impulse an effectual barrier can be set up and no touch 
sensation will ensue. The problem, then, is still on our 
hands. Seeing, hearing, tasting the object, are only the 
first steps, and not yet perceptive knowledge. Evidently 
we must go beyond the physical sense organs if we are 
to get much light on the modus operandi of sense per- 
ception. 

The question we are discussing is as old as reflective 
thought. The early Greeks answered it by saying that 
the objects throw off little images of themselves that 
enter through the senses and are apprehended by the 
spirit within. This was a real attempt at explanation, 
but so crude and naive as hardly to merit a passing word 


30 THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


of criticism. Not only have we no evidence that images 
are thus thrown off, but if they were, they would in no 
way account for the perception of the object; for it is 
the object, not the image, that we see. The Greek expla- 
nation with certain modifications survives in principle 
among the so-called empiricists of the past two centuries.* 
These empiricists held that knowledge of external objects 
resulted from impressions made on the mind. ‘They 
thought of the mind as like a blank sheet of paper or a 
wax tablet prepared to receive in a passive way the im- 
pressions as somehow representing the object. But the 
impressions do not see themselves. If they did, that would 
not be the same as seeing the object. 

Another view, much more satisfactory, yet still beset 
with difficulties, is that raw material is given from without 
in the form of an unorganized manifold which is fash- 
ioned into things by the mind. This theory is ambiguous. 
It may mean that the given is an infinitely fine dust of 
passive elements, or it may mean that the manifold con- 
sists of a dynamic urge administered in successive pulses. 
The alternative of strictly passive or strictly active ele- 
ments might be questioned as not exhaustive, and the 
contention made that they are neither wholly the one 
nor wholly the other. Why may they not be of the 
nature of things in the outside world, though not yet put 
together and related as we find them in experience? The 
different qualities, for instance, might come as distinct 
data (“‘sensa,’’ as some call them) —like furniture shipped 
in a “knocked down” state—which combine according 
to inherent laws after they reach the mind. This sug- 
gestion is superficially plausible. But if we would be 
consistent in our thinking, we cannot stop short of the 
alternatives as stated. When we try to think of sense 
objects as partly active and partly passive, the passive 
parts fall away and disappear, leaving only the active to 
function in knowledge. The given manifold then cannot 


1Cf. Locke, Essay Concerning Human Understanding, bk. ii. 
chap. viii. § 12; bk. iv. chap. iii. § 23. 


DUAL CHARACTER OF SENSE WORLD 31 


be a static or passive manifold. As such it could give 
not the slightest hint of its own nature, and could not 
be used in an explanation without losing its passivity. 
The strictly passive is the non-existent. 

When, however, we think of the given as a succession 
of stimulations from a source that is adequate to the 
needs of the situation, we begin to see light; the difficulties 
one by one clear away. ‘The transition from the static 
to the dynamic view of the given in sense perception is 
not altogether easy. “The old view tends to persist and 
infect our dynamism. The thinker who can hold himself 
steadfastly and consistently to the dynamic conception of 
the given has the key to most of the persistent problems 
in philosophy. This will become more evident as we 
proceed. 

‘The theory that we have been considering shows ad- 
vance by representing the mind as active in the construc- 
tion of the object. Two questions naturally follow: 
What is the nature and form of the mind’s activity in 
sense perception? and what, precisely, is the contribution 
from the outside? “These questions recognize that percep- 
tion is a joint product. To neglect either factor is to fail 
of real insight. If, on the one hand, the mind does noth- 
ing, then the object may conceivably be crowded into it 
without the slightest response in the way of knowledge. 
If, on the other hand, the object is passive, it may be any- 
where or anything without making itself known. There 
must be interaction; the mind must be affected through 
stimulation and must respond with constructive work. 
Having gained this initial insight we can face other dif- 
ficulties as they arise. 

Along with the two main questions certain others sug- 
gest themselves and press for answer. One of these is 
particularly urgent and merits at least a passing considera- 
tion, even though it plunges us into the midst of contro- 
versial matters that we are not yet prepared to discuss in 
a thoroughgoing way. The question is, If the object as 
known is really a joint product of stimulation and re- 


32) JPHE WORE DOR SENSEOPERCEP TION 


sponse, what is the difference between this object and the 
real object that seems to exist in outer space, whether we 
perceive it or not? ‘The question is urgent only because it 
expresses a misunderstanding which should be cleared 
away as soon as possible. When we speak of the known 
object as a joint product we are speaking of the real ob- 
ject lying out there in real space. If the questioner con- 
tends that there is another object as the original of the 
one we apprehend, yet entirely distinct from it, he is met 
by the difficulty that this original cannot be in the same 
space as the known object, for that space with all its con- 
tent is our mode of apprehension, our constructive response 
to the independent stimulations, Nor can this assumed 
archetype object have the same nature as its ectype, the 
known object, unless it contains the same constructive ele- 
ments and these elements are all mental in origin. There 
is a sense, as we shall see later, in which the two objects 
can be distinguished, but the distinction falls within the 
field of the knowable. It is the distinction between the 
object as it appears to the observer at a given moment and 
the same object as it may appear at other times and to 
other people. 

But if the object may appear at various times, is it not 
independent of any single appearance? So plausible is 
this conclusion and so useful in meeting certain needs of 
reflective thought that it holds out against all criticism. 
It has repeatedly been expounded as all but self-evident, 
then abandoned because of its inherent difficulties, and 
afterwards taken up again when the alternative possibil- 
ities have been canvassed. It must be so and it cannot be 
so, seems to be the best we can say. ‘The final answer, 
whatever that may be, will involve the main issues of 
philosophy. For the present we must suspend judgment 
till the evidence is all in. Meanwhile the outside world, 
rockribbed and ancient as the sun, persists, apparently in- 
different to our individual notions about it. To raise the 
issue at all thus early is to give notice that the common- 
sense view will be called upon to defend itself. Nothing 


DUAL CHARACTERS OR SENSE) WORLD) 33 


is settled in philosophy till it satisfies the requirements of 
comprehensive consistent thinking. Certainly we must as- 
sume, as a minimum, that something independent of us, 
call it what we will, furnishes the continuous stimulation 
or control, while the response of the mind is of such a 
character that the resultant object seems itself to be inde- 
‘pendent of us. The riddle remains. If it can be solved to 
the satisfaction of the student, the outlining of a world- 
view will become comparatively easy. The main dif- 
ficulties that block the way at present to a solution arise in 
large part from a very natural confusion. When one 
draws the line between the independent object and the ob- 
ject as it happens to be known, one assumes that the sup- 
posed independent object is the source of the stimulations 
that control the mind’s activity in sense perception. This 
assumption really gives us two known objects, the one the 
cause of the other, while both as known are products of 
thinking. But the two persist in coalescing. The real 
object, then, as the known object, plays a double role; it 
is presumably the source of stimulation acting antecedent 
to experience and also the resultant construct that can ex- 
ist only in experience. It is thus the cause of itself. How 
can a tree, for instance, be the cause of our having the 
perception of a tree and at the same time be the tree that 
we perceive—both the cause and the effect? Much in- 
genuity has been expended in trying to resolve this puzzle, 
yet with little success. Better hold strenuously to the 
conclusion that the source object and the sense object are 
not the same. But where, then, is the source object? Does 
it resemble the known object in form or color or texture 
or any quality whatever? To ask such questions is to. 
call attention to the glaring difficulties in the notion of 
two objects. Space, though infinite, cannot harbor both; 
they refuse to remain in the same world. ‘The difficulty, 
as we Shall see, is resolved when we abandon the attempt 
to identify the source of stimulation with any sort of 
space-filling object. 

But now another question obtrudes. If the cosmic 


34 THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


object, in so far as known, cannot be the cause of our 
knowing it, since as known it is the mental response to 
antecedent stimulations, what is the status of the cosmic 
object? It is certainly not a mere chimera, that is, it is 
not in the mind in the sense that the pons Varoltt is in 
the brain. It maintains a definite position out in space and 
acts as if it had nothing to do with the observer. It con- 
forms to mechanical laws, and unless alive, changes its 
states only as it is acted upon from without by some other 
object. The mind, on its part, if it thinks at all, must 
conform to the laws of its nature. It may: construct im- 
ages, analyze, compare, and arrange its thoughts without 
in the least affecting the nature or activities of the things 
in the outside world. [Thus our world seems again to 
split apart. Neither part can exist without the other and 
neither can be reduced to the other. The thought order is 
not the thing order; the two seem to be related only ex- 
ternally. This issue is formidable only in appearance. 
While it may not be entirely disposed of till we approach 
the end of our studies, a provisional solution that may 
meet our present needs can be found in two considerations. 

Thoughts have contents; they refer to something other 
than themselves. We may think of another thought, or 
a phenomenal object, or a fantasy, but never of the think- 
ing itself while it is being thought. For this reason, cer- 
tain philosophers call in question the distinction between 
thought as process and thought as object. But evidently 
to deny that thought is a process—thinking—is to deny 
thought altogether, and to deny that it is, at the same 
time, content is to take all significance from it. 

The second consideration is that every thought object 
has a nature which is expressed by the way it acts in its 
own environment. For instance, a novelist creating his 
characters and placing them in definite situations, lets 
them act in accordance with the nature he has given them. 
Otherwise he would lose caste as a literary craftsman. So 
the mathematician starting with certain postulates and un- 
dertaking to work out their implications must recognize 


PU AL CHARACTER, OR SENSE: WORLD) 35 


that they have a rational structure that must be respected. 
He is bound to obey the laws of the world he creates. 
We must conclude then that the distinction between the 
activity of thought in sense perception and the activity 
of things as apprehended raises no issue in the least pecu- 
liar. As process, thought is controlled by a complex of 
rational and other influences; as content, that is, as mean- 
ing an object, it belongs to an apparently independent 
world. 

But when we speak of thought as a process, we must 
not make the blunder of identifying it with any move- 
ment in space. As process it is not in any sense picturable. 
This statement is perplexing to beginners, and frequently 
remains a stumbling block even to advanced students. Too 
many people hold that the non-spatial is the non-existent, 
and by that they mean unreal. Not much can be done 
for those who take this stand. “They live in their imag- 
ination. The saying of certain physiologists of the last 
century, notably, Karl Vogt, that the brain secretes 
thought, sounds plausible to such people because the proc- 
ess can be imagined. But that which is thus imagined 
turns out to be some kind of physical movement. By 
their imagination, alone, they cannot grasp the nature of 
reality as such, not even physical reality. “They merely 
confuse certain ideational constructions, certain schematic 
representations of motions (such as movements of brain 
particles), with thought as process. 

But one who is thus confused may ask, If thought is 
not movement in space, why call it a process? “The an- 
swer is simple. We call thought a process because it in- 
volves logically separable stages. As process, thought is 
strictly sui generis, without analogue in the physical world; 
as product, it is the world of objects apprehended by 
means of the senses. Even the fact that there is a process 
we discover only from a study of the product, especially 
the experience of error. In thinking the wrong result, the 
mind exhibits its activity. If all our thought content 
could be referred directly and with no possibility of mis- 


36). THE’ WORLD OF SENSESPERGEPR TION 


take to an outside world, we might never suspect that any 
thinking is involved. 

The tendency to discredit thought as process finds sup- 
port in that the process as such is never experienced. Its 
work is done in a twinkling. Even the reaction time of 
the psychologist does not indicate the speed of the mind's 
activities, for the reaction time is mainly distributed be- 
tween the afferent and the efferent nerve currents. If only 
the mind would slow down sufficiently and the thinking 
be accompanied by friction or effort, we might feel some- 
thing doing and study the activities by direct inspection. 
What these would actually be, we cannot even guess. Nor 
would such knowledge be of much service; for not the 
fact of activity, but its significance in acquired meanings, 
is what we want. Apparently, then, the only way to get 
this information is to study the world as perceived by the 
senses. In such study we can reason back from the ac- 
complished fact to what is implied in its accomplishment. 


CHAPTER II 
THE THOUGHT STRUCTURE IN OBJECTS AS PERCEIVED 


We are now ready to study the characteristics of our 
sense world as having a thought structure. “These struc- 
tural characteristics taken in their particularity are beyond 
computation in number. Each object seems to be an in- 
finite complex of them. Moreover, each is changing con- 
tinually. “The sun never comes back to the same place in 
the heavens, the mountain that seems so firmly rooted and 
steadfast is different in every ultimate detail from what it 
ever was before, and it will never again be what it is now. 
So of all things. To enumerate the specific features of 
even a single object would be strictly impossible, for the 
object would be something else before we had well begun 
our inventory. Yet for our present purpose the distinctive 
features of the objective world may be gathered up into 
large irreducible classes, each of which may be treated for 
the time being as homogeneous. Sense perception reveals 
a temporal-spatial world of material things differing in 
the greatest variety of ways, qualitatively and quanti- 
tatively, and changing in such wise as to suggest, if not 
necessitate, the affirmation that they are causally connected. 
Their activities are measurable, and display an orderliness 
expressible in definite laws. ‘These features must be ac- 
counted for, since they are a part of our experience. It is 
a question whether, strictly speaking, they are all found 
in sense experience; yet they do actually constitute the 
framework of the world as apprehended even by the un- 
reflective. As a matter of fact, what we find in the sense 
world depends upon the thoroughness of our analyses. For 


B vi 


38). THE \WORCD OF SENSE, PERCER TION 


instance, we shall find it convenient for our purpose to 
treat space and time as if they were what common sense 
with its crude methods and practical interests considers 
them to be. Yet the mathematical physicist, concerned 
with problems of refined measurement, raises many ques- 
tions of great philosophical import with reference to the 
subtle connections between the concept of space and that 
of time. Ignoring these questions for the present, we 
may treat space and time as separable aspects of our ob- 
jective world. There is no danger of our confusing 
them. We need only to bear in mind that these distin- 
guishable aspects and the others we are to consider are 
nothing more than aspects and are not to be taken as hav- 
ing any separate existence in rerum natura. 

1. SPACE. As we try to orientate ourselves in our 
multifarious and changing world, one of our first needs 
is to find elements that are fixed and changeless to which 
thought can anchor. In the realm of ideas we approxi- 
mate such elements by the discovery of laws, principles, 
mathematical truths. To satisfy this need in sense ex- 
perience we may follow the scientist in his analysis of 
substances into their ultimate elements, but even these are 
discovered to have only relative and hypothetical fixity of 
nature. In fact, there is only one way to reach the ab- 
solutely static in experience, and that is to eliminate by an 
act of abstraction every feature of the world that could 
possibly change. Pure space, the absolute void, is the 
result. As such it is never experienced or even imagined 
in its utter nothingness. Yet, as an idea, it is made to 
yield all those insights that constitute our geometries and 
trigonometries. 

When we think of space as in any conceivable sense a 
thing, we allow it to take over elements of experience from 
the realm of change. ‘This process is begun in treating it 
as a nexus of relations. It is then no longer pure space. 
As has been intimated, pure space is a limiting conception 
to which the mind can only approximate. We know that 
our sense world is in space, and we think of this space as 


A@HOUGHT STRUCTURE IN,OBJECTS: (39 


spreading out into infinity. No part of it, however re- 
mote, can be entirely detached from what we see, for space 
forms a continuum. | 

In studying our world of sense perception, we naturally 
want to know what is meant by saying that an object is 
in space. Does the space do anything to the object? Or 
is it a mere container, enveloping the object and giving it 
a locus with reference to other objects? What is meant 
by space relations? If the object is not indifferent to 
them, space must be more than a void or nonentity; it 
must be an energy of some sort. To meet the difficulties 
here suggested the modern conception of space has been 
worked out. Is space a thing? we may ask. No, comes 
the answer, because if it were it would act like other ob- 
jects of experience and require another space to contain it. 
To think of space as active is to deny its nature as the 
place of things. Yet if we think of space as utterly and 
altogether passive, it would be meaningless to say that a 
thing occupies space and sustains space relations to other 
things. ‘The relations are the relations of the thing in the 
sense that the thing would not be the same if the relations 
were changed or obliterated. The relations, then, are 
strictly objective, and the thing is a thing in relations. It 
is inconceivable that a thing should have no relations and 
yet be in the world. Evidently we need to ask a back- 
lying question if we would meet the contradictory re- 
quirements of a rational conception of space. How do 
we come by the experience of things as in space, and of 
space as the place of things? [he answer to this ques- 
tion will set us on our way toward a solution of all the 
puzzling problems that center in the nature of objective 
space. 

The space that we want to know about is the external 
space of real physical objects, not any mere imaginary con- 
struction. Now the general conviction is that this space 
is external to the mind. Nevertheless we must grant that 
however external to ourselves the objects of the outside 
world may be, they are in space for us because we are 


40 THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


compelled to think them there. First the stimulations 
directly affect the mind, then immediately the objects are 
spread out in space before us. Apparently the essential 
thing is that the stimulations reach the mind, for if in 
any way they are interfered with so that they fail of their 
destination, no experience of an outside world follows. 
That is, the stimulations cannot be spatially separated 
from the mind if they are to be efficacious. This line of 
reflection leads to the curious and, in the end, vitally im- 
portant conclusion that the stimulation itself 1s non-spa- 
tial. We find, then, that on occasion of a non-spatial 
form of activity affecting the mind, a spatial world exists 
for us, a world that we take to be real and entirely ex- 
ternal tous. This looks like an extreme paradox. Never- 
theless it is a plain statement of the facts with a minimum 
of inference, and it involves no actual contradiction. Some 
inference there is, it is true, namely, that space is a form 
of the mind’s constructive activity and therefore exists 
only for the mind while it is active in this particular way. 
As a minimum this is a considerable inference. It means 
that not only the space of fantasy but phenomenal space, 
extending as far as light can travel, is directly the work of 
the mind. Nothing could induce a person to accept this 
conclusion except the most incontrovertible evidence that 
it is the only conclusion possible in the premises and that 
it is adequate to resolve our difficulties. Let us, therefore, 
consider first some of the common misunderstandings that 
becloud the issue, then the difficulties inherent in the theory 
and how to meet them, and finally the explaining value 
of the conception in overcoming the contradictions en- 
countered in all other conceptions. 

One common misunderstanding takes this form: If 
you consider space as mental, you require that the mind 
be as vast as space. Another form of the same objection 
is: ‘he space you are discussing is necessarily subjective— 
it is merely mental—whereas the space of the outside world 
is objective. What has the individual observer to do 
with the space on the other side of the world? Another 


THOUGHT STRUCTURE IN OBJECTS 41 


misunderstanding growing out of the foregoing is that if 
space is subjective, so are all objects in space. Hence the 
world, the physical universe, turns out to be a subjective 
mirage created by individual fantasy. Such a view would 
be the last expression of absurdity. 

These misunderstandings are difficult to meet because 
they are the outgrowth of thought habits. Underlying 
them is the assumption that the mind is a mere container 
of its ideas and hence is itself in space. To see that this 
view of the mind is incorrect we have only to reflect that 
what we call mind must be something that thinks. Its 
thinking is the only evidence that it exists. It produces 
ideas, content and all, and its ideas are all its own. We 
possess ideas only when we have ideational content, that 
is, objects of thought. To say that the objects thought 
of are in the mind is to deny that they are the product of 
the mind’s activity. In this connection, ‘‘are in the mind” 
is a meaningless expression. If then the space of experi- 
ence is mental in origin, it is not mind nor any part of 
mind, but a form of the mind’s constructive activity. 
How can this be? ‘To answer this question is to obviate 
the one serious difficulty inherent in the conception itself. 

But before we pass to its consideration, we must touch 
upon a second assumption that leads to misunderstanding 
about the mental origin of space. It is assumed that what 
is mental is therefore fanciful. Our most ordinary expe- 
riences so constantly negative this assumption that it falls 
away on a moment’s reflection. In our thought-world we 
distinguish what is true and therefore independent of our 
mere thinking from what is the play of our fantasy. The 
one differs from the other, not in being non-mental, but 
in having a nature that the mind must respect. My type- 
writer, for instance, remains just what it is and where it 
is in space, though J exert my utmost will power to think 
it otherwise. But the flowers that my daydream pictures 
as imaginary objects show no such obstinacy. I can do 
with them what I will, just because their existence de- 
pends wholly upon myself. If I would replace them by 


47° THE WORLD (OR“SENSEVPERGCER TION 


something else or have them change into something else, 
I should need only to change my way of thinking about 
them; there would be nothing in their objective character 
to prevent my making this change. Such creations of idle 
fantasy are naturally regarded as merely subjective, where- 
as the objects that must be thought in a determinate way, 
if we would know the truth, are put into the apparently 
independent world where all their characteristics and in- 
terrelations are objectively determined for them. Now to 
provide the utmost objectivity for thought-content that 
we take to be matter of fact or truth, we need only hold 
that the mind in thinking this content is controlled by an 
independent power. Because the mind influenced by this 
power must think as it does, it objectifies the content of 
its thought. This is only another way of saying that we 
experience an objective world because something acts upon 
us in the way of successive stimulations. Science traces 
various media involved, but the results are actually experi- 
enced only when the immediate contacts are made. When 
these two assumptions are rooted out, the misunderstand- 
ings that grow about them wither away. 

Once the misunderstandings are disposed of, the in- 
herent difficulties abate surprisingly. We may still won- 
der how it is possible for the mind to be active spatially, 
but such wonder accompanies the recognition of any ex- 
istence whatever. We can only wonder how anything 
exists or acts as it does or affects other things about it. 
Things have a nature expressive of their mode of activity 
—that is the fact of observation. “That minds exist with 
a characteristic nature is evidenced by our thinking. We 
can certainly get no light on the nature of thought, either 
as a process or as a product, by identifying it with the 
brain. “Thinking must be taken for what it is, and if it 
is not like physical movements, then we have two dispar- 
ate kinds of activity to reckon with. But we find relief 
from the apparently bizarre character of the conception 
that space exists only for the mind that thinks it, if we 
reflect on the following considerations. (1) We are con- 


THOUGHT STRUCTURE IN OBJECTS 43 


cerned with the space of our sense world, not with a 
hypothetical space that can exist in its own right as the 
space of a world by itself. Such a space severed entirely 
from our knowable world is in the strictest sense unknow- 
able. If it could be said to be a facsimile of the space of 
our world, it would have the same origin. But by hy- 
pothesis it is independent, hence we can safely ignore it 
in our present inquiry. (2) There is nothing in the 
physical world as known that cannot be essentially dupli- 
cated in a vivid dream. “The dream-world can be as vast 
and quite as real for the dreamer while he dreams. Its 
unreality as judged by our waking experiences lies not in 
its being of mental origin, but in our not being able to 
provide a place for it outside the dream. (3) The im- 
mediate antecedents of sense perception, as we have said, 
are not the apprehended space objects, for they are many 
media removed. Effective stimulation requires immediate 
contact. Knowledge of a world in space follows upon the 
influence of a non-spatial something affecting the mind 
and controlling its activity. What this something is we 
shall have occasion to consider in due time. 

When we speak of space, we usually think of the limit- 
less void that envelops the world. But this is a derived 
idea. We certainly do not experience it in its entirety any 
more than in its empty purity. Every perception has its 
own space, which is limited and full of objects and con- 
tinues only as long as the perception lasts. A slight 
change in position makes the perceptive space different both 
in extent and in content. Only as the mind, by means 
of experiences that we need not here specify, is able to 
single out the common characteristics of these perceptual 
spaces and blend them into a continuum, do we have the 
conception of an all-containing space, of which the spaces 
of sense perception are but parts. Since this continuum is, 
as we have said, a limiting abstraction, we naturally think 
of it as in itself empty, homogeneous, and infinite. Man- 
ifestly it is quite as much a thought construction as are 
the perceptual spaces. 


44 THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


Does this conception of space as a form of the mind’s 
constructive activity prove adequate? Can it meet the 
difficulties and resolve the contradictions? Most of the 
difficulties encountered by the contrasting view of space 
can be summed up in the dilemma: Either space has the 
nature of a thing, influencing other things, and then it is 
not space at all; or it exerts no influence whatever on 
things, and then to be in space or to be spatially related 
is without meaning. Either space is an energy or it is 
nothing, and as an experience it is neither. Now the view 
that space is the form of the mind’s response to stimula- 
tion resolves the dilemma with ease. Space is not a thing, 
not an energy or influence, nor yet is it a meaningless 
vagary or mere emptiness. It is the thought structure of 
the mind’s experiences. As such it presupposes a dynamic 
transaction which is non-spatial in character, but which 
determines the relations of objects in space to one another. 
Objects influence one another in accordance with space 
variants. This fact produces the impression that space it- 
self is the source of the connection, or at least a sort of 
go-between. [hat such an impression is illusory need 
not now be argued. ‘The space of the mind’s experience 
world has all the objectivity and reality that experience 
can give it, and space relations are as real as the objects 
related in space. 

Furthermore the apparent discrepancy between percep- 
tual and geometrical space is adjusted by thinking of space 
as a form of experience. Perceptual space is limited in 
range to the objects of an actual perception, whereas geo- 
metrical space is the all-encompassing space of the whole 
objective world. ‘The two, however, can be readily har- 
monized. “The many perceptual spaces all express the same 
laws of perspective and relation, hence they inevitably 
blend into a unitary continuum. Its unity is involved in 
the unity of experience. From the subjective point of 
view the unity of space may mean also the unity in the 
form of the mind’s activity. Such a statement of the case 
seems satisfactory till we try to include literally all the 


PHOUGITS PRUGTURE IN: OBJEGTS (45 


spaces that make up our experience. The space of the 
objective world is one without doubt, but what of dream- 
spaces and the spaces of imaginary scenes such as we 
find in novels? The impulsive answer is that they are 
not real spaces. Nevertheless they originate in the same 
way. The scene of a novel may be so vividly conceived 
that it seems almost as real as life itself. Dream -spaces are 
unquestionably real to the dreamer. When we say that 
space is One, we must mean, then, that it is one in so far 
as experience is a continuum. We may have as many 
spaces as we have distinctive, totally disparate experiences, 
though only one of them can be real to us at any given 
time. What right have we to say that only one can be 
real? The right lies in the conviction that space, being 
a continuum, cannot find room for a second space. The 
reality of one particular space rather than another depends 
on the nature of its contained objects. 

The unlimited character of space can be explained in 
a similar way. Whether phenomenal space is unlimited or 
not, we cannot tell from actual experience, but we can be 
quite sure that the mental activity in which space origi- 
nates does not contain in itself the hint of a limit. We 
can think space as far reaching as we wish, and know that 
if we would, we could think space beyond. All limits are 
therefore arbitrary. 

As our concept of space is an abstraction from the ex- 
perience of space-filling objects, the question is of interest 
and has been much discussed whether there could be a . 
“real’’ space of less or more than three dimensions. A 
flat space of two dimensions is conceivable as a derived 
idea, but could not contain objects. We can think of such 
a space as a possibility only because we as the observers 
supply the indispensable third dimension. But if we 
treat space as a system of relations, we can investigate the 
‘properties of a one-dimensional or a two-dimensional 
space without reference to their existing in the objective 
world. ‘The properties could be expressed in mathemat- 
ical formulae that would be perfectly valid within the 


46 THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


initial assumptions. Mathematicians have found such in- 
vestigations worth their while. Yet it is not self-evident 
that their results apply to the objective world. The space 
that can contain the objects of sense perception requires 
three dimensions. But what of four-dimensional or 
n-dimensional space? “These are names given to mathemat- 
ical formulae elaborated on the analogy of our three-di- 
mensional space. It is pure assumption that they can be 
objective in the sense that the external world is objective. 

But may not time be the fourth dimension? This 
suggestion which has received much attention has led to 
results that have proved very significant, especially for 
celestial physics. It led Einstein, Eddington, Whitehead, 
and their followers to posit a primordial four-dimensional 
continuum as the original from which space and time, as 
we know them, are developed. Into the intricacies of 
these speculations we shall not venture to go. Suffice it 
to say that they yield the principle of relativity which 
seems destined to be of revolutionary importance. From 
the philosophical point of view we can appreciate the 
emphasis of the relativists upon the close inner connection 
between space and time. ‘The ability to treat them as as- 
pects of a four-dimensional continuum apparently disposes 
of the theory held by Newton and most physicists since 
his day that absolute space and absolute time are entities 
independent of the observing intelligence. They cannot 
be such entities if they are so fundamentally related as 
seems evident. But if we consider space and time as forms 
of the mind’s constructive activity in sense perception, 
their relatedness follows as a matter of course; they are 
distinguishable aspects of the one experience. The mind 
can do what it will with its ideas so long as it respects 
their nature as revealed in experience. Einstein’s math- 
ematical operations upon space-time relations have appar- 
ently turned out to be valid for the objective world; he 
has given us new insight into the inner nature of these 
relations. As nothing can be in space and not also in 
time, and nothing in time can be objectified except under 


THOUGHT STRUCTURE IN OBJECTS 47 


the spatial form, continued study of the two together 
promises to throw still further light on the problem of 
reality.1. Such study will force to the front the question, 
What sort of reality can endure through time and operate 
in space? ‘The question will occupy us later. 

2. TIME. Not only the outside world but also the 
inner life has a temporal form. ‘There is no such thing 
as a non-temporal experience. This very universality of 
time is an embarrassment when we try to tell what it is. 
We cannot imagine or even think a condition unconnected 
with time. We cannot so adjust ourselves as to look at 
it from the outside. When, for instance, we say that 
mathematical truth is non-temporal, we do not mean that 
its sphere of application is in a non-temporal world—an 
impossible notion, as we shall see—but rather that it is 
true for any adequately informed intelligence, anywhere, 
at any time. Another difficulty of a psychological nature 
is at first even more troublesome. We do not seem to be 
able, without special training, to think time except by 
picturing it as having dimensions, as standing or flowing 
or compassing events. But these are all space images. 
Space is the very essence and image of the eternally static, 
whereas time derives all its meaning from the fact of 
change. Things coexist in space, they succeed one an- 
other in time. Strictly speaking, only the present exists 
objectively, if indeed it does exist; the past is a memory, 
and the future an anticipation. [he mind persistently 
tricks itself, and lands in confusion by transferring to an 
objective world its own apprehension of an ideal past and 
a future no less ideal. “This confusion is responsible for 
some of the most vexatious blunders that we make in 
thinking about the nature of reality. 

What do we mean, then, when we say that the world 
is in time? The answer must be in accord with certain 
facts. (1) Each event happens in its own time, yet is 

1 See S. Alexander, Space, Time, and Deity. For the mathematical 


treatment of the subject see A. S. Eddington, Space, Time, and Gravi- 
tation. 





48 ‘THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


connected in experience with the event that follows. Thus 
there seems to be no break in the objective continuum. 
Only when we try to understand time, that is, grasp it as 
an idea, does it fashion itself into a succession of disparate 
instants. These instants are mutually exclusive; they 
never telescope, nor can one be prolonged into another, yet 
they blend in experience. From one point of view, then, 
there are as many times as there are events, and there are 
as many events as indivisible instants of time. This cer- 
tainly is bewildering. rom another point of view, time 
is one, a continuum, without apparent beginning or end; 
the instants are mere cross-sections or arbitrary divisions 
within the continuum. ‘This view raises as many diffi- 
culties as does the other. ‘Time as a continuum must 
somehow exist, but by definition as well as by the evidence 
of experience, the past no longer exists and the future is 
not yet, so that time again reduces itself to the indivisible 
instants which for thought are in no way connected. The 
two views must be harmonized. Time is a succession 
of discrete instants without duration, and time is an un- 
broken continuum whose very nature is to endure. Both 
these statements are evidently true. Yet how can they 
be harmonized? Only by viewing them as two comple- 
mentary ways of looking at experience. If we think of 
time as an aspect of the mind’s response in sense percep- 
tion, the continuum becomes an obvious feature of each 
individual’s enduring flow of experiences. “The connec- 
tions of part to part arise out of the unity of the mental 
life. On the other hand, the discrete disappearing in- 
stants that seem to the analyzing intellect to constitute 
time are the results of the search in the non-enduring for 
the underlying nature of duration. Both duration and 
the non-enduring elements are the work of the mind. Ex- 
perience appears as a continuous succession of vanishing 
moments, or rather of events that follow hard upon one 
another. 

(2) ‘The experience of an event as present always in- 
volves a measurable duration in which can be distinguished 


Poe tala Sw UGhURE IN OBJECTS 49 


a past and a future. It is this past and this future that 
constitute the experienced present. Were it not for these 
elements the present would vanish entirely; the wall of 
partition between the two would be appropriated by the 
past and the future which do not exist. 

It would not be enough to say that the past is a mem- 
ory, for the word memory contains the problem. Re- 
membering, as an act, is in the present though it refers to 
the past. The past, then, to which it refers must come 
into existence in the act of remembering. The past is 
ideal. It is constructed by the mind and as an act is in 
the present. In every respect it is what the exigencies of 
our experience and our interests require. If the con- 
structed past contains many events that need to be arranged 
in a temporal order, it will seem to be extended and the 
first number of the series will seem far away. If we hold - 
in consciousness but few events to be arranged, and es- 
pecially if these are vividly before us, the series will seem 
short. “The same event of a temporal series may seem near 
or far away in point of time according as we concentrate 
or withdraw our attention. “Thus our past is continually 
changing. Every new experience modifies it by introduc- 
ing a new interest, a new attitude. Some events become 
more interesting, some less, and some drop out altogether 
as the new experience captures attention. Not only are 
we thus continually reconstructing the past, but the work 
of reconstruction is all done in the present, making the 
past an integral part of our present experience. In other 
words, every experience is a complex in which some fea- 
tures are referred to a past as representing an experience 
that no longer exists in its original form, and some are 
held to constitute the immediate present. “To be in time, 
then, is to have a place in experience; to be a part of the 
experience continuum is to have the temporal form. 

When these obvious facts are admitted, the mental or- 
igin and nature of the past—form and content alike— 
seem to follow as a matter of course. Yet the conclusion 
is being questioned by some as unintelligible. They rea- 


50. DHE WORLD OP SENSE PERCEPTION 


son that memories are in some sense replicas of the old 
experiences and are stored up somewhere, presumably in 
the cortex of the brain. “Those who reason thus overlook 
two important facts. (a) An experience and a memory 
of it are different. While the memory may be almost as 
vivid, it lacks the qualitative detail of the original. If 
this were not the case, the later occurrence would have the 
status of a new experience and not of a mere memory. 
As a matter of fact, confusion may easily arise as to the 
status of a given experience whether, as content, it is some- 
thing new or has been experienced before. ‘The charac- 
teristic feature of a remembered experience is the reference 
of it to an ideal past. It is dated. So long as we can 
make this reference we have no difficulty in distinguishing 
the old from the new, the experience from the recollection. 

(b) <A past event can never again exist as that par- 
ticular event. Even a repetition is another event with 
different connections. ‘The event that ceases to be with 
its present leaves nothing behind it, except as the mind for 
which the event existed carries over the idea. As an event, 
it cannot push itself into a later present. ‘This applies 
especially to the current notion that each event passes over 
into its successor, as if its life were thus prolonged. But 
such prolongation is unthinkable. ‘There is no accumu- 
lation, no rolling together of reality, as Bergson might 
be interpreted as saying. “The only possible way in which 
an event can continue is representatively in the life of the 
mind. ‘The past then is made in the present. It lasts 
while the mind works in that particular way, and ceases 
as that identical past when the mind changes the form 
of its activity. 

We rightly think of the past as changeless, because we 
can no longer manipulate the conditions that determine 
the character of the remembered experience. But change- 
lessness pertains to it only because it no longer exists as 
event; there is nothing objective that can be changed. As 
constituted by the mind in the act of remembering, the 
past is manifestly as changeable as our interest in it. Just 


MOOUGH Ly ST RUGrURBOINGOBJEG TS 51 


as no two people can have in mind the same picture of an 
historic event, so no individual can continue to hold his 
own idea unchanged for long. From this point of view 
the changeless past is a pure fiction. 

What we have said of the past applies mutatis mutandis 
to the future. Not only does the mind reconstitute its 
past experiences and thus create history; it sets before 
itself a something that represents what in the course of 
nature is expected to happen. When this is done with 
vividness, any future, however distant, is brought close 
to the present. In neither the past nor the future is the 
order of events under our control. The order may become 
confused, the series unduly shortened by dropping out im- 
portant links, and the crudest inaccuracies committed, if 
we are sufficiently careless. Nevertheless we have the con- - 
viction that every event has its determinate place in the 
temporal series, and that its place can be known by us. 

But how can we explain such knowledge? What in 
the stream of stimulations enables us to arrange our re- 
sponses in the right order? Are there, in fact, any stimu- 
lations as the direct antecedents of the remembered experi- 
ence? ‘The easy way of meeting the issues is to say that 
the remembered experience is stored in the cortex and when 
the brain cells concerned are restimulated, the old experi- 
ence recurs. But with that conception decisively rejected, 
not much of real explanatory value can be said. ‘The 
problem is this: As both the past and the future are pres- 
ent constructs in so far as they exist for the knower, what 
in the present complex determines the order and distri- 
bution of the experiences, some of which are referred to the 
past and some thrown into a hypothetical future? ‘The 
question can be answered only in a formal way and in- 
ferentially, since the temporal order is achieved in the very 
act of experiencing. We cannot experience the cause of an 
experience. 

As regards reference to the past, we approach an ex- 
planation in distinguishing the actual factors at play. 
Within the ensemble of the mind’s constructive responses 





52. AUB WORLD SOR SENSE CHER GE PatLahin 


to present stimulations, there are separable portions each 
with characteristic marks. Some portions are less vivid, 
less insistent. As these are of such a nature that they can- 
not coexist with the others in the phenomenal world, they 
are relegated to a present that no longer exists. These por- 
tions are arranged in a temporal order, as near or remote, 
according to their characteristic marks, and also in con- 
formity with what we know of the course of nature. 
The entire structure of the past is built up, consolidated, 
and made more definite with the growth of knowledge 
under the urge of practical needs. For instance, the inter- 
esting event of yesterday is thought as having occurred so 
many hours before our immediate present, because it is 
known to have happened under certain cosmic conditions. 
The known laws of change in the outside world then de- 
termine the definite place of the event in the series of ex- 
periences. The lapse of time, however, may seem long or 
short according to factors already mentioned. In spite of 
all indications, psychological and objective, we are likely 
to be inaccurate in our references to the past, unless we have 
recourse to memoranda or the testimony of other people. 

The order in the anticipated events that constitute our 
ideal future is subject to the same uncertainties as the order 
of remembered events. But as regards the future we may 
seem slightly better off. At least the reference to the cos- 
mic movements is likely to be more decisive, since the order 
of nature is the ground of expectation. We can know, 
generally speaking, that a certain number of changes must 
take place in nature before a given expectation can be 
realized. 

That we have a temporal order at all comes about, as 
we have said, because certain objective situations are known 
to be mutually exclusive, cannot coexist. An object, for in- 
stance, cannot be hot and cold at the same time, though it 
can in successive moments of time. To make room for 
such incompatibilities we arrange our experiences in an 
order of sequence. Does this mean that in extra-mental 
reality the events occur simultaneously, or that they are 


eo UOrio OG RUR Ea TIN OBJECTS 1/53 


not successive until we arrange them? No, but it does 
mean that we apprehend them as a succession only as the 
mind weaves them together in a temporal order, and to 
do this the mind must command the entire series as a 
present possession. ‘This necessity of a mental synthesis 
involved in the very existence of the time series explains 
the relativity of the time span. The length of time is a 
function of the number and character of the mutually ex- 
clusive events that we are able to hold in thought. 

All that we have thus far been considering may seem to 
be purely a movement in the individual mind; but what of 
the cosmic time of external nature? In so far as it is known 
it differs from the time we have been discussing only in 
being a blend or abstract of the manifold temporal series 
that constitute our complex experience world. It is con- 
ceptual time, analogous to conceptual space. By methods 
of analysis and generalization we are able to grasp the 
events of the outside world as constituting a whole in 
which the succession is continuous and unending. The 
time series of experiences may be broken by periods of un- 
consciousness or by shifting attention, but the world order 
is inevitable, constant, and of comparatively uniform rate. 
By a simple act of abstraction we separate the order from 
the events themselves and view it as a pure one-dimen- 
sional continuum. We are strongly given to thinking this 
continuum as strictly non-mental. Must it not be if it is 
cosmic? 

One of the deepest lines of cleavage in current philosophy 
is here suggested. Is there an independent time distinct 
from all mental construction? If we deny that there is, 
we face the problem of a changeless objective world, a now 
that has no relation to a past or a future. Thought can 
make nothing of such a monstrosity. If we affirm the ex- 
istence of an independent time, we must conclude that 
everything is in flux except time, or rather that the world 
continuously vanishes in the act of coming into being. 
This would mean that when we think of the world as 
substantial reality we misrepresent it; the only reality 


54 THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


would be time itself. We are not now ready to face this 
issue. Leaving it until our general argument brings us to 
a higher level from which to consider it, we may revert to 
the question, In what sense is the world as known in 
time? 

The world is known to be in time as the knower re- 
thinks the events and arranges them in a temporal order. 
Time is simply the order of arrangement for these events. 
Had we not this power of ideal recovery, there would be 
no time for us and hence no world. The distinction of 
past, future, and present depends on various psychic fac- 
tors. Though the remembered or anticipated event is as a 
rule relatively simpler, less vivid, less obtrusive, the decisive 
factor in the distinction is volitional. The present is the 
time in which we are acting; the past, the time in which 
we no longer act; and the future, the time in which we 
expect to act. 

The volitional basis of temporal distinctions is ig- 
nored when we think of time as a conceptual content. 
The result is disastrous. As conceptual content, all three 
tenses must be thought as coexisting in a sort of timeless 
duration. ‘Time thus becomes indistinguishable from 
space, change is unprovided for, and the world is reduced 
to illusion. The concept of duration is of great service 
and need not mislead us if we realize that it is a mere ab- 
straction, a skeleton view of persisting experiences. The 
apprehension of a temporal series is time-encompassing, 
and time-encompassing is what we mean by duration. It is 
an image of a transaction. Just as we speak of duration as 
if it were something objective, so we may think of memory 
as a storehouse, anticipation as a quasi possession. Both 
experiences intermingle with the present; yet they are held 
apart, and each is given its distinctive character by its 
relation to the conative side of our nature. The suggestion 
that time is the fourth dimension comes apparently from 
the tendency to intellectualize time and thus assimilate it 
to space. 

We may summarize, then, by saying that time, subjec- 


THOUGHT STRUCTURE IN OBJECTS 55 


tively considered, is the principle of arrangement of mu- 
tually exclusive experiences; objectively, it is the warp of 
our weaving. Asa mental synthesis time involves a fairly 
complex activity of a creative sort. That time seems to 
be extra-mental is explained by its connection with objects 
of a temporal series. The objects are quite naturally 
thought to be independent of the mind, because they main- 
tain themselves against any non-physical effort to change 
them. But the apparent independence of objects can, as 
we shall see presently, be easily explained in harmony with 
the conclusion just stated. “This being assumed, we can 
see why the many perceptual time series so easily blend 
into one, and why the one time is thought to be limitless. . 
It is one because it is the continuous activity of the same 
mind; it is limitless because nothing in the working of the 
principle compels the mind to stop in its synthesis. 

In working out a conception of time we find compli- 
cations like those encountered in the discussion of space. 
There are times and times, and some of them refuse to 
weld. Dream time like dream space, belongs to a different 
world from real time. And so of the various temporal 
systems developed in imaginary plots. Such time systems 
are as real as the make-believe objects that they connect. 

3. SUBSTANCE. Space and time are the conditions of 
our having a world of objects, but it is the objects them- 
selves that first arrest our attention. We live in a world 
of physical things; with them we must continuously 
reckon; the laws of their nature we must respect. Life 
consists largely in finding our way among them, adjusting 
ourselves to them, and discovering methods of making 
them do work for us. We may doubt much of what has 
been held to be true of the outside world, but we cannot 
seriously doubt the existence of these physical things. They 
are the substantial realities of experience, complex in 
structure, having manifold properties, occupying space, 
and enduring through time. Assuming, then, that they 
are real and exist somehow in their own right, we have 
now to ask, What is involved in our knowing them as 


56.’ THE WORUD (OF PSENSE IPERGEPTION 


individual substances with diverse and changing proper- 
ties? 

When we try to answer this question, others crowd upon 
us for preliminary consideration. What precisely do we 
mean by thinghood or substance? Is it an existence dis- 
tinct from its changing properties? If we could think away 
the properties and have a residuum of substance, what 
would it be? But if we should have no residuum, must 
we not wholly identify the unitary substance with its 
manifold properties and its changing states? To the un- 
sophisticated a state of a thing is the thing at the moment 
manifesting its various properties. But just as we are per- 
plexed to distinguish the substance from its manifested 
properties yet cannot identify it with them, so we seem 
debarred from giving substance more actual existence than 
is contained in its present, though we call it a substance 
because it is supposed to have existed through a past. Our 
conception of substance thus reveals some awkward incon- 
sistencies. In it we seem to be trying to hold together two 
incompatible notions—the manifold properties (appear- 
ances) that constitute the substance and the unity of the 
substance as presumably something other than the prop- 
erties. But our difficulties will largely clear away as we 
study the part substance plays in our mental economy. 

To apprehend physical things as real existences, we 
must receive continuous stimulations from an independent 
source. When we say ‘“‘continuous,’’ we mean that no 
recognizable intervals exist between the successive beats of 
stimulation. Nevertheless the nature of time compels us to 
think of the stimulation as a continuously renewed impul- 
sion. Each renewal follows so closely on its predecessor 
and is followed so immediately by another, that the whole 
constitutes for us a continuum. It is this continuum that 
we presuppose in the experience of objects. “[he successive 
stimulations may all be so similar in character that the 
mental response will mean a thing existing without per- 
ceptible change; or the stimulations may be so different 
one from another that the response will mean a changing 


PERO es lin Gag Res ING OBIEGT Si"5 7 


thing. In either case the thing or substance is that which 
the mind posits as carrying and uniting the qualities ex- 
perienced under the control of the stimulations. As ex- 
isting, the thing is located in the present, yet the present 
is only the temporary terminus; the thing extends back 
into a past that exists only ideally. 

At this point it is difficult for us to avoid a certain 
lapse in our thinking. So prone are we to assume that ex- 
ternal objects are independent things, that we find it far 
from easy, without losing all touch with reality, to hold 
strictly to our problem of ascertaining what the mind does 
in thinking substance. If we confuse the world of known 
and knowable objects with a supposed independent world, - 
our perplexities become contradictions. A thing indepen- 
dently real would have to be and not to be its states. As 
identical with its states, it would lose itself in the suc- 
cession; but as different from its states, it would cease to 
be the ground of the succession, and substance and states 
would be hopelessly divorced. Furthermore to exist in an 
independently real world, substances would need a time- 
less time in which to exist, that is, they could not change 
without losing their substantial character. The same diffi- 
culty of a timeless existence pertains to each state of the 
substance. There could be no succession in such a world. 

When we avoid this confusion and hold to our problem, 
we find that two aspects of our experience in sense per- 
ception call for explanation; one is the emergence of ob- 
jects as substantial things in the external world, the other 
is the order of their sequence. “The easiest and most nat- 
ural way to satisfy this vaguely felt need for explanation 
is to posit something of the nature of force or energy as 
the cause both of the manifestation and the order. This 
is likely to satisfy us so long as we are not too critical 
and move well within the sphere of practical interests. 
Things or substances thus become for the knower the dy- 
namic center of activity. Each thing is marked off from 
all others by the character and rate of its qualitative 
changes, It is what it is by the law of its nature, which 


58 THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


means that its manifestations are the expression of law 
and, therefore, all emanate from the same source. This 
source thus becomes for us not only the cause of the 
observed activities but the cause of our having the ex- 
perience of thinghood. It is in this way that we are able, 
with some show of reason, to refer all cause to the physi- 
cal world. ‘The uncritical view by which we live is, then, 
that the objects of the external world are themselves the 
source of stimulation by which we come to know them, 
and that they mutually determine their properties or states 
in accordance with inherent laws. 

This analysis of our common-sense view is supported 
by the reflection that the essential characteristic of sub- 
stance is resistance. A substance or thing is that in nature 
which up to a certain limit withstands our efforts to 
change its states, but which yields when the pressure is 
applied beyond the limit. Both the resistance and the 
yielding are significant. If the world of things resisted 
without yielding at any point, there could be no motion, 
no life, no experience. If, contrariwise, the yielding were 
entirely without resistance, like Lord Kelvin’s frictionless 
fluid, there would be no evidence that anything existed. 
Thus we reason plausibly about our world. We find 
support not only in the idea of resistance, but in that of 
change according to law. While each thing is looked upon 
as a more or less self-contained center of activity, it is 
also observed to affect other things in characteristic ways. 
The nature of a thing or substance can thus be expressed 
by the series of changes possible to it under environing 
conditions. As soon as we begin to reflect on this situa- 
tion, substance threatens to vanish into phases of activity. 
But in practical life we do not need to reflect very much 
on such matters. Our whole conception of external reality 
thus turns on a combination of conceptions that will not 
bear close inspection, yet perform an important function 
in connecting the elements of our experience that seem to 
belong together, and holding separate those that apparently 
should be kept apart. 


THOUGHT STRUCTURE IN OBJECTS 59 


The immense practical value of this device for organiz- 
ing the elementary features of our experience amply jus- 
tifies it, even though to critical thought it seems faulty. 
The mind can make nothing of the continuous flow of 
events. It must have something in the temporal series that 
remains constant in order to provide a resting place for 
thought. Otherwise nothing could be laid hold of and 
made a theme for study. When, therefore, the members 
of a succession seem to follow a law, we affirm substance 
as the sufficient explanation. When, on the other hand, 
the succession does not reveal any dominant law, we dis- 
tribute the events into various distinct groups, that is, 
we affirm that more than one substance is involved. To 
think of change as without foundation in reality is ab- 
surd. To think of this causal reality as elsewhere than at 
the point of its manifestation seems equally absurd. Hence 
the mind never rests till it can think of substance dynami- 
cally and as located in the midst of the activities to be 
accounted for. It is the dynamic element in the substance 
which makes it seem concrete and independent of us. If 
under critical pressure we should try to mend our ways 
and abolish the idea of substance as substratum explaining 
the successive evanescent events, we should have our labor 
for our pains. 

The external world becomes real and significant for us 
in the act of substantializing our experiences. “The ease 
with which we do this conceals the activity involved. It 
seems to do itself, or rather it seems to be a mere presen- 
tation to consciousness of the thing-world in its elemen- 
tary completeness. Only as we analyze the result into its 
distinguishable steps do we begin to appreciate the nature 
and complexity of the work done by the mind. It must 
build its world of things out of a flow of incipient ex- 
periences (‘‘sensa’’). “These elements are never thought 
in isolation, but are combined into groups and endowed 
with energies in accordance with the apprehended order. 
We overcome the logical difficulty of the one (as thing) 
and the many (as the states of a thing) by saying that 


60° “THE (WORLD, OF SENSE ;PERGER TION 


the multiplicity is in the states and the unity is in the 
law of their sequence. The thing is more than the law 
by as much as it is thought to be of the nature of a force 
or energy. [his vague conception of thinghood, when 
generalized, gives us the current notion of matter as fur- 
nishing the body to law, and effectiveness to energy. 

Not only do we think of separate things as centers of 
controlled activity, but these things act as if they affected 
one another. This fact complicates our world in some 
respects and simplifies it in others. Ignoring the compli- 
cations for the present, since they appear only to critical 
thought, we can see the simplifying influence of the new 
idea. Instead of having a world composed of infinitely 
numerous unrelated things we now advance to the con- 
ception of groups of things that belong together. Com- 
paring these groups we find that they too seem connected 
and can be formed into larger groups. Thus in the quest 
for a super-substance or a generally dominating force, we 
create the problem of causal connection. But before we 
take up this—the central problem in philosophy—we need 
to devote a few paragraphs to the subject of change. 

4. CHANGE. Our world of substantial things in space 
and time is also a changing world. Change characterizes 
it throughout; nowhere can we find anything that does 
not change, unless we except the content of our concepts, 
and they are said to be changeless only because the ex- 
perience of change involves a passing from one conceptual 
content to another. Objects that to the casual observer 
seem to be absolutely immutable are known to the scien- 
tific student, equipped with instruments of precision, to 
be undergoing continuous change. Even the ancients knew 
this; at least Heraclitus declared that all things flow; 
nothing is changeless except the law of change. It is, as we 
have said, partly by the rate and manner of change that 
we distinguish one object from another. But the fact 
that we can distinguish a rate and manner of change im- 
plies that the succession has a certain order and arrange- 
ment. To account for this order we affirm causal connec- 


sPHOUGH LT STRUCTURE IN, OBJECTS: 6] 


tion. Thus in our most elementary experiences we find 
at work three closely related concepts expressive of three 
distinguishable aspects—substance, change, and causal con- 
nection. Each implies the others. 

We have now to consider what are the mental elements 
in change. ‘These elements have already been differentiated 
in our discussion of substance. here we saw that a sub- 
stance was a unity of successive experience data expressing 
a definable nature. “That the data may mean substance, 
they must follow a certain order, excluding absolute 
breaks. So it is with change. Unless the different experi- 
ences in a temporal series are so related that they appear 
as the successive states of the same thing, they are reckoned 
as expressing not change but mere succession. Thus if we 
saw a chair to the right of our desk and a moment later 
saw another chair like the first one but on our left, we 
might conclude that the second chair was merely the first 
one in a changed position. But to draw this conclusion 
we should want to know not only that the first chair 
was no longer on our right, but that sufficient time had 
elapsed for it to be removed to the place on our left. If 
there had been no appreciable interval between the sight 
of the chair in the first position and the sight of the 
chair in the second position, we should think of the dif- 
ferent appearances not as a case of change but as indicat- 
ing the existence of two independent chairs. In short, the 
laws of translation through space must be satisfied if 
we would identify the chairs as the same object in different 
positions. In all change, whether translation or internal 
modification, something posited as substance must be 
thought as continuing to exist through the series of ap- 
pearances and exemplifying a law of connection among 
successive manifestations. Kant puts this idea aphoristi- 
cally when he says that only the permanent changes. The 
essence of change, then, is not in the successive states, 
but in the law of the sequence. It expresses a relationship 
between the successive states of a thing. This law is in- 
terpreted as the substance or thing when the element of 


62 THE WORLD OF SENSE PERGEPTION 


permanence is uppermost in our thought, and as change 
when the differences among the states are stressed. 

‘That change involves a constructive mental activity is 
evident. It presupposes the original fixating act, an inter- 
weaving of experiences in a temporal series, the discovery 
of a definite order binding the members of the series to- 
gether, and the recognition that these members are the suc- 
cessive states of the same thing. If any of these steps 
should fail, the result would be something less than the 
consciousness of change. 

‘The issue is often complicated at this point by the in- 
trusion of the irrelevant question, Do not changes take 
place whether we apprehend them or not? Even if we 
should answer this question in the affirmative, we should 
leave our own problem untouched. We are concerned 
solely with the question, How do we come to know 
change? It is the mode of procedure that interests us just 
now. When we get the facts of analysis before us, we 
shall then be ready to draw momentous conclusions from 
them. 

The changing thing is apparently both itself and not 
itself, both permanent and successive. One source of per- 
plexity in this conception is the nature of all ideational 
content. The content of an idea does not change. We 
may change, but the idea does not. We may pass from 
one idea content to another and realize a difference, but 
the change is not in either idea. The litmus paper may 
cease to be blue and become red, but the idea of blue 
remains the same, even when it no longer applies to the 
object. The question then arises, How can we think 
change by means of concepts that are themselves change- 
less in content? If all our mental furniture consists of 
concepts and all concepts are by nature static, change is ap- 
parently inconstruable. ‘This purely intellectual difficulty 
looks formidable, in spite of the fact that we apprehend 
change with perfect ease. “The full explanation involves 
much that we are not yet ready to discuss. To meet our 
present difficulty we need only point out that change as an 


THOUGHT STRUCTURE IN OBJECTS 63 


experience is not a concept at all. It is the shock of dif- 
ference felt in passing from one state of the object to an- 
other. Change is interconceptual. Later on, in the study 
of the self, we can carry forward this suggestion. 

5. CAUSAL CONNECTION. In sense perception each ob- 
ject seems at first to be individual and self-contained, 
because of its distinctive manner of change. Yet there is 
abundant evidence even to the casual observer that dif- 
ferent contiguous objects change with reference to one 
another. They cannot, therefore, be wholly isolated. How 
completely they are connected is a question for science to 
answer. [hat they are all connected and form a system 
has for science become practically axiomatic. The con- 
nections are not only contemporaneous but successive in 
time. That is, the sense world, at any one instant, is 
thought as not only forming a system of interconnected 
elements, but also as somehow a resultant of antecedent 
conditions. This conception of causal connection is one 
of the central problems of philosophy. 

Our interest at present is in the question, how the mind 
acquires the conception of interrelatedness in nature. Yet 
it is needful to consider first what we mean by cause. 
The passage from substance to cause is inevitable. Just 
as in the case of a thing with changing states we think 
that something of the nature of energy permeates and holds 
together the states and explains their order, so we affirm 
a cause to account for the apparent connections of sub- 
stance with substance. We felt as we considered substance 
that the conception of a dynamic substratum could not 
easily be justified in the eye of the critic, and yet was 
persistently affirmed because of its practical value. The 
feeling of uncertainty increases as we try to utilize the 
same device to explain the interconnection of things. 

The idea of causal connection is itself far from clear. 
As the basic principle of explanation in the field of ob- 
jective nature, it has been subject to various modifications 
of meaning. These meanings so blend in ordinary think- 
ing that any discussion of the subject is apt to seem hazy 


64 THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


and confusing. —(wo meanings in particular should be 
sharply distinguished and from them a third may be de- 
rived which is intermediate. “These three meanings may 
be distinguished verbally as (1) Productive Causation or 
effective volition, (2) Scientific Causation or uniformity 
of coexistence and sequence, and (3) Causation as popu- 
larly understood, which includes the idea of a force or 
energy resident in the object as the real ground of any 
emergent effects. A word concerning each of these will 
further reveal the work done in getting our sense world. 
One of the inscrutable mysteries of experience, not less 
a mystery because incessantly repeated throughout our 
waking life, is effective volition. Prompted by desire, we 
will to produce a change in the outside world so as to 
make it yield some further good; and immediately the 
muscles of the body respond in concerted activity for the 
realization of the purpose. We call this volitional or pro- 
ductive causation; but we mean only that following an 
act of volition, physical changes take place. “he connec- 
tion, so far as we can see, between the act and the result 
is merely a matter of fact and not at all necessary. Its fre- 
quency in experience dulls the sense of strangeness, but only 
multiplies the mystery for thought. Nevertheless, whatever 
may be the explanation, if there is one, volitional causa- 
tion is the model of all causal connection, since it is the 
only one we know directly through experience. It is at 
times set aside or modified under stress of the difficulties 
encountered in construing it, only to be reinstated, as 
after all the one type that does not beg the question. 
Primitive man was naive enough to accept it as every- 
where in control. He peopled the world with spirits, each 
having limited powers, and each administering the affairs 
of its little domain in accordance with its own private 
will. In this rough, uncritical way were the activities of 
the outside world explained to the satisfaction of the 
primitive man. Spirits made the wind blow, other spirits 
caused the growth of plants, others brought the rain or 
the lightning and thunder. It is hard for one trained in 


THOUGHT STRUCTURE IN OBJECTS 65 


the modern way of looking at nature to imagine fully such 
a view of the world. 

With the rise of scientific interest and the growing em- 
phasis on the objective point of view, the volitional ele- 
ment has become less and less evident, until in the con- 
ception now prevalent only the bare form of connection 
is retained. When the scientist says that every event has 
its cause in the immediately preceding situation, he means 
that every event has a determinate place in an orderly 
world. In thinking thus he has in mind order more than 
determinateness. If any one should ask him what actually 
determines the place of a given event in the cosmic series, 
he would—true to form—simply refer to the antecedents. 
By so doing he saves himself from interminable contro- 
versy and satisfies all scientific needs. But the reference to 
the antecedents is really no more than a reassertion of 
orderliness. If one should take it as an explanation, that 
is, as accounting for what happens in experience, it would 
signally fail. 

The most serious difficulty would lie in thinking a 
connection between two events that occupy different mo- 
ments of time. By definition the antecedent precedes the 
event, and hence ceases to be by the time the event occurs. 
‘The temporal separation breaks the causal connection; the 
hiatus is complete. A productive cause must, therefore, 
coexist with its effect. Some have thought to avoid this 
conclusion by referring to the antecedent as transforming 
itself in producing what follows. ‘‘Is not matter inde- 
structible? Does it ever really cease to be when it takes 
on new forms?’’ The fallacy in this bit of picture-thinking 
has already been exposed. As matter is merely an abstrac- 
tion from material things, it has only an instrumental 
function. So long as we continue to have experiences of 
natural processes, matter in this sense will continue to be 
indestructible. Other attempts at explanation hover about 
the idea of a force or influence that is supposed to survive 
the antecedent and pass over into the next moment of time 
and work for the production of the effect. This sugges- 


66 ‘THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


tion brings us to the third or popular conception of 
cause in nature. 

We have seen that the scientist, in working out his 
problem of tracing uniformities in nature, has no need of 
cause in the productive sense. Yet only slowly did he dis- 
cover that he could do without it. His present conception 
is the last stage in a rather painful process of stripping 
and attenuating the old persistent spiritistic conception. 
Only because the spiritistic conception survives in modified 
forms do we have to reckon with the third meaning of 
causal connection. ‘This uncritical meaning is, as might 
be anticipated, full of vagueness and confusion. While 
discarding the intellectual or purposive element in voli- 
tional causation, it retains the assumed power to produce 
results. “The vague idea is held that resident capacities 
in things enable them to affect one another and bring 
about a new situation. Though things as mere things 
have no will and cannot plan or realize a purpose, they 
can maintain themselves, can up to a certain limit resist 
efforts to change them, and can influence one another. 
Evidently in this idea we have something more than de- 
scription and less than explanation. While appearing 
within the precincts of science, it is exorcised by scientific 
criticism. “Though philosophical in intent, it is discredited 
among critical philosophers. But it maintains itself 
everywhere by virtue of our easy-going ways of thinking. 
So long as we are uncritical, it has the strongest possible 
support in the ineradicable conviction that whatever hap- 
pens in nature must have a sufficient cause. Where are 
you to look for this cause if not among the objects of the 
sense world? Is not the cause where it acts? and it acts 
among things. It must be force. 

This conception of force is basal in popular philos- 
ophy. Its affinity with the notion of substance has been 
pointed out. It is scarcely more than this notion extended 
to explain the interconnection of things. In the case of 
substance we are not greatly troubled by apparent contra- 
dictions; the idea has practical value, it helps to organize 


MHOUGH TS TRUGHT UREVIN: OBJEGTS | | 67 


our incipient experiences. So long as it works it justifies 
itself. But when we would explain interconnection by 
reference to the idea of force, logic insists on being heard. 
Force, as blind and unintelligent, has no way of resist- 
ing dissolution into mere process. If for the time being 
we assume that it does persist, it immediately breaks up 
into as many forces as there are things, then it passes over 
into the states of things and thereby multiplies itself in- 
definitely. At this point its logical instability becomes 
manifest. It is not any particular event in a causal series, 
but each in turn, persisting yet changing; the same con- 
sidered abstractly as cause, yet different considered as 
event; one yet many—an impossible conception except for 
an uncritical attitude of mind. 

Nevertheless the notion of a pervasive persistent force 
as the ground of change in the world about us haunts all 
our thinking. This is perhaps because it superficially sat- 
isfies the mental demand for a real explanation of why 
things act as they do, and because at the same time it has 
the semblance of being scientific, since it discards spiritistic 
or volitional implications. Under criticism it passes in- 
evitably into one of the two types previously distin. 
guished. How to choose between these two contrasting 
types we shall have to consider later on. We may then 
find that each is valid in its place. Causal connection is 
so intrinsically a philosophical problem that its solution 
with the implications constitutes philosophy. 

As a mental functioning, the recognition of causal con- 
nection involves a fairly complex mental activity, and is 
throughout a construction, as has already become evident. 
The insight that every event and every relation between 
events is unique suggests the character of the work done in 
attaining the idea of causal connection. This work in- 
cludes complicated processes of classification and the dis- 
covery of invariable ratios between given events and the 
rest of the world of events. 

6. QUALITY, QUANTITY, AND NUMBER. We have now 
seen in part how the mind, under stimulation from an 


68). THE WORLD OPSSENSE TEERGEE i@h 


extra-mental source, weaves its sense material into the ex- 
perience of a temporal-spatial world of substantial things 
that are ever changing, and that sustain such relations to 
one another as lead us to affirm causal connection. All 
through our discussion thus far we have assumed qualita- 
tive and quantitative distinctions among things. “These 
deserve a word, because they further reveal the mental 
activity in sense perception. 

The qualities of things seem to be original sense data 
which the mind simply receives as given. But they are 
no more sense data than are substances. When the mind 
responds “‘figuratively,’’ as James would say, to the stim- 
ulations, the thing with its qualities stands before us. 
Just as things or substances come into being for us only 
by a complex, though subconscious, activity of the mind, 
so the qualities or attributes of the thing exist only by 
virtue of mental work. ‘The apprehension of quality re- 
quires a sense of contrast. “Thus red is known in contrast 
with some other color. Heat declares itself only in the 
presence of different temperatures. [he sense of contrast 
involves comparison, which is itself a rather complex proc- 
ess. For comparison of one object with another, both 
must be held before consciousness at the same time and 
our attention must pass from one to the other. A feeling 
of sameness or difference results. 

We need to recall the frequently mentioned fact that 
things with their qualities are strictly responses to stim- 
ulations. “To account for qualitative differences among 
things by reference to corresponding differences among the 
stimulations is merely to assert that the qualities, whatever 
their nature, have a sufficient ground. “The apprehension, 
then, of quality, presupposes stimulations and a complex: 
process, including the fixation of sense data, a comparison 
of these with one another, a feeling of sameness or dif- 
ference, and the appropriate identifications. These steps 
are not taken consciously, and their order here given is 
logical rather than temporal, but they indicate what the 


PHOUGIIE ST RUG TURE IN GOBIEEC TS 4.69 


mind must do to get its world of qualitatively different 
objects. 

In the apprehension of quantity we go a step further 
and generalize upon qualitative distinctions. Only as the 
qualities are reduced to a common denominator can they 
be compared quantitatively. In such comparison we must 
have a standard or unit of measure. We then answer the 
question, How much? in terms of this standard. As soon 
as we get beyond the most elementary quantitative com- 
parisons, we encounter difficulties in determining what the 
standard shall be. Where extreme accuracy is required, as 
in scientific work, the selection of a standard becomes a 
task of considerable complexity, as is evidenced by the 
work of the Bureau of Standards established by govern- 
ment. 

Counting and measuring complete the quantitative 
comparisons. We are now interested only in pointing out 
that all the processes involved in counting, adding, sub- 
tracting, multiplying, dividing, are mental. Hence we 
must class number as one of the elementary forms of 
mental activity. 

7. PURPOSE. ‘The foregoing characteristics of nature 
as it appears to us in sense perception are so structural, so 
necessary to the very existence of nature, that we may, 
with Kant, call them constitutive principles. There is 
another characteristic, not so evidently necessary and not 
exactly structural, yet manifest in our ordinary view of 
nature, namely, purpose. ‘To unscientific, practical people 
every object in nature expresses a variety of purposes. As 
soon as a person is asked to name the dominant purpose, 
he begins to grope. The object seems to conserve many 
purposes but is defined by none. Moreover purpose can- 
not be anything objective, it is not concrete or tangible. 
Nature might conceivably be exhaustively described with- 
out once referring to purpose. Why then mention pur- 
pose as a fundamental aspect of the sense world? Because 
we are studying how the mind actually proceeds in get- 
ting its concrete actual world of sense perception, and can- 


70). (/THE. WORLD! OF (SENSE) PERGER TION 


not ignore purpose without overlooking a primary char- 
acteristic. 

What do we mean when we say that there is purpose 
in nature? As applied to human conduct, purpose clearly 
refers to the controlling ideal in the working out of a 
plan. ‘This ideal and the material to be fashioned are 
quite distinct; either might exist without the other. But 
when we speak of purpose in nature we must think of the 
material as existing in and for the purpose. “The purpose 
would have to work throughout the concrete material, 
whatever its form, and the material in every stage of its 
transformation would be exactly what the purpose re- 
quired. No conception of purpose in nature that falls 
short of this could bear a moment’s criticism. On what 
grounds do we incline to attribute purpose to nature? The 
psychologist would point out that we are simply trans- 
ferring to the objective world a characteristic of our sub- 
jective life of volition. While this is true as a description 
of what happens, it does not give the reason for the trans- 
fer. [he suggestion of purposiveness in nature comes 
from many sources, two especially. (1) Living organ- 
isms show continuous adjustment to their environment 
whereby they maintain themselves, grow, and produce 
after their kind. (2) The environment itself is adapted 
to the performance of these functions. “The very usable- 
ness of things points to a more or less definite relation to 
some end. Further, every object whether in the organic 
or the inorganic world, awakens our interest and to that 
extent stimulates us to seek the purpose in things. Yet 
experience does not encourage such a quest. Purposive- 
ness is vaguely felt as a sort of aura enveloping all experi- 
ence but becoming increasingly elusive as we endeavor to 
fixate it in a definite concept. We live in a world that 
superficially seems to be full of purposiveness; yet nowhere 
except in human devising can we find a purpose that helps 
to explain the nature of a thing. Because of this fact the 
scientific biologist, who might be most interested in ob- 
jective purpose, dismisses the matter and refers all vital 


PHOWGri Mra te We CORE INT OBJECTS vovil 


adjustments to adaptation. But adaptation is a kind of 
purpose with intelligent forecast left out. Organisms and 
environment are adapted to each other. So too the dif- 
ferent parts or functions within the organism are mutually 
adjusted. ‘This is as far as science can go. Because science 
can make so little of purpose, people of scientific tendency 
would read purpose out of their sense world. Neverthe- 
less, as a matter of fact, its unobtrusive presence colors 
every concrete experience connected with that world. We 
may then consider purposiveness as playing its part in the 
make-up of our sense experience. Later we shall see a 
more fundamental reason for holding to purpose as a 
principle of explanation. Purpose, while not a consti- 
tutive principle in the Kantian sense, may well be what 
Kant called a regulative principle in accordance with which 
we must think nature. Just as the notion of substance 
includes a reference to the past, so purpose reaches into 
the future and takes account of what is to be. 

Other principles have been distinguished; but we need 
not consider them here, since our present aim is simply to 
show that the most necessary features of concrete experi- 
ence are mental in origin. 

‘These general aspects of nature as experienced in sense 
perception reveal a very complex constructive activity on 
the part of the mind. ‘They are not separable elements, 
but rather the distinguishable principles of construction. 
Because of their generality they have commonly been 
called categories, to distinguish them from other less gen- 
eral concepts. We build our world in accordance with 
these principles. “They are as real as the laws of growth 
in a tree, and are as non-existent. We have no choice in 
conforming to them. Given the stimulations, the form 
of response is as inevitable as any phenomenon of life. 


CHAPTER III 
THE QUESTION OF VALIDITY 


1. THE WORLD AS A CONSTRUCTION BY THE INDIVID- 
UAL. We must further postpone the question whether 
an external world actually exists apart from all mental 
activity. We still need to fix our attention exclusively on 
the world as we experience it. But another question, 
which to many seems not another, arises concerning the 
validity of our sense world. Is the world we have been 
sketching real? Is it actually the world of everyday con- 
tacts? Or have we, after all, been moving about in an 
ideal realm where thought laws and structural principles 
may hold sway, but with which the real physical forces 
in nature—the substantial earth, the flood of waters, the 
sun and the distant stars—have nothing to do? ‘This 
question, as an inner protest, has repeatedly forced itself 
on our attention as we carried forward the discussion of 
the thought forms. ‘The answer is, we repeat, that we 
have been discussing this physical universe as it is, in so 
far as it comes within our ken. But we have considered 
only its intellectual structure. For this reason it seems 
to be merely a simplified imitation of nature, a film of 
unrealities. 

That this seeming should be taken for fact without 
much thought is easily explained. We are primarily prac- 
tical beings, busy with making adjustments and overcom- 
ing obstacles. Preoccupied in this way, we seldom have 
occasion to think of the world of the not-me as itself an 
integral part of our experience. ‘This attitude of indiffer- 
ence or innocent ignorance is abetted by the difficulties 
we are continually encountering in our efforts to har- 


19 


ire Ours TION OR AVAL TOLL Y, he 


monize our thought with experienced realities. We blun- 
der as if by nature, we make false identifications, mis- 
judge perspectives, and draw erroneous inferences. We 
are likely to be careless or inattentive; the sense stimula- 
tions may be insufficient to call forth the correct responses; 
there may even be structural conditions that make our 
conclusions inevitably false. Practically all experience 
accentuates the distinction between the actual world in 
which we live and our thought about that world. Hence 
the problem of validity is fundamental. 

In approaching the problem of how the mind blunders 
and recovers, we need again to consider from a slightly 
different viewpoint the ground already traversed. We 
noted that the stimulations which are the immediate ante- 
cedents of sense experience come in blended rapidity, each 
ceasing instantly as the next comes into being. ‘This fol- 
lows from the nature of temporal existence. If, then, the 
mind’s response were without constructive activity, the 
result would be a continuous flow, or hardly a flow in 
any definable sense. We could not call it experience, for 
that implies a permanent element. The first act of the 
mind then is to give fixity to some feature of its response. 
The stimulations presumably are all different, but the 
mind must make some part of its response representative 
of the rest. Thus the apprehension of an approaching or 
receding object involves many actual perceptions of the 
object at different distances from us and consequently of 
different sizes, not to consider the other differences. But 
the real object of sense experience is not supposed actually 
to vary in these manners. ‘The reality is a fixed quantity 
with relatively fixed characteristics which need not be 
identified with any one of the several perceptions. This 
fixation of parts of the experience continuum, making 
them representative of the rest, is what we call generali- 
zation, and the result is a universal, though it is also an 
individual object. 

All our sense knowledge is therefore representative; it 
has the character of universality and bears the marks of 


74. THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


being a manufactured article. The ultimate individual 
in which there is no universal element can never be 
reached. We start with universals as things, and our 
world-building consists in making them over and organiz- 
ing them into groups. While this is interesting in itself, 
it is of paramount significance in the study of validity, 
for it is the source of our most troublesome errors. We 
may be very much concerned as to which of the successive 
appearances shall be taken to be the real object, yet what- 
ever our choice, it will represent the others only inaccu- 
rately and in a general way. Hence we might infer that, 
if we could see things as they are, we should behold real- 
ity continuously slipping past our fixities. Fortunately 
for practical life, we do not need such vision; it would be 
a source of embarrassment to us. 

As psychology teaches us, cur actual choice depends on 
certain considerations of convenience. So long as we can 
account for the main differences between the accepted real 
and the other members of the perceptive series, by reference 
to relative distance, difference in atmospheric conditions, 
and the like, we satisfy practical needs, and are inclined 
to ignore the inevitable inaccuracies. If we must take 
these into account, as in making the specifications for a 
building, we allow ample margins. ‘The business of sci- 
ence is to reduce the element of inaccuracy to a minimum. 

But through carelessness or lack of data we often fail 
to reach the needful degree of accuracy, and when trouble 
arises we conclude that we have made a mistake. It is 
entirely a question of more or less. When the mistake 
is glaring we are apt to class it with illusions, though that 
term is generally reserved for false identifications among 
objects. The point to be noted is that the only differ- 
ence between illusion or mistake and accepted fact is one 
of degree. The element of inaccuracy 1s inescapable. 

The test of truth in sense perception is then entirely a 
practical one. “This means that a given deliverance of 
the senses may for a certain purpose be accepted as true or 
accurate, while for some other purpose, perhaps more ex- 


HE QUESTIONIO“ VALIDITY. ifs 


acting or even simply different, it would be manifestly 
false. We have no matters of fact that are not constructed 
to order or that exist without reference to human interests. 
They all express a human bias. Their stability merely 
reflects the continuity of practical attitudes. This is true 
even of the simplest facts of experience, like the apprehen- 
sion of the so-called primary qualities of objects. These 
qualities, such as extension, figure, number, motion, are 
wholly cbjective, yet their relativity to experience cannot 
be denied. 


This relativity of truth becomes more striking as we 
continue to trace the law-giving presence of the universal 
in all sense thinking. From the primary acts of fixation, 
by which we secure perceptive universals, through to the 
utmost reach of scientific generalization, every step is con- 
trolled by practical exigencies and involves the construc- 
tion of new universals. These successive universals of 
increasing generality and simplicity are of course indis- 
pensable to comprehensive thinking. “They constitute the 
major part of our mental furniture and tend to usurp the 
place of concrete individual objects. When this usurpa- 
tion takes place their congenital inaccuracy exposes us to 
serious danger. “[o make the usurpation plausible, these 
abstract universals must needs acquire what, for want of 
a better term, might be called psychic filling, something 
essentially indeterminate, nebulous, amorphic, the hazy 
suggestion of the reality that is being ignored. 

All may go well with such devices in our mental econ- 
omy so long as we remain within the logical range of ap- 
plication; but once the universal of high generality has 
established itself as a quasi individual (has been hyposta- 
tized), the temptation is to use it as if it had all the rich 
content and usableness of the individuals subsumed under 
it. Then trouble begins. We proceed unwittingly to 
draw conclusions as to the nature of individuals in all their 
complexity, on the strength of what we know about the 
class universal. This fallacy of abstraction (secundun? 
guid), like the weeds in an ill-kept garden, will vitiate al! 


76° THE) WORT DOR SENSE (PERGEP TON 


our thinking unless we are continually on our guard 
against it. 

No wonder that universals, looked upon as expressing 
the inner nature of tbings, should, down through the ages, © 
have been treated as possessing a reality of their own, a 
reality more fundamental even than that of things. “They 
are relatively more permanent, are more usable in all the- 
oretical constructions, and are capable of being more ade- 
quately expressed in language. As expressed they become 
the verbal coin of all communications, the containers of 
transmitted lore, the instruments of scientific manipula- 
ction, the basic elements in all our thinking. In what 
sense, if at all, universals are real, we shall need to deter- 
mine later. But evidently they lack the tangible, sense- 
impressing qualities that we find in physical things. Be- 
cause of this patent fact, the position of the realists—that 
universals or essences are real in the objective sense—has 
been challenged by the so-called nominalists, who hold 
that universals are only names for classes and at best exist 
only in the mind. From our studies thus far we can take 
issue with the nominalists to a certain extent. We can 
point out that even the individual thing is a true univer- 
sal, a synthesis of successive appearances; hence to call a 
universal, as such, a mere name is to commit oneself to 
the absurd conclusion that all objects of sense are fictions. 

Within the world of experience the practical require- 
ments of life must determine what is to be considered real 
and what not. Beginning with the most definite object 
of sense perception, we can legitimately call real all that 
stands the practical test. But can anything short of the 
strict individual in all its definiteness stand such a test, if 
the test is applied with all thoroughness? The answer is 
near at hand. It is furnished by what has just been said 
about the practical character of all synthesis in sense per- 
ception. In identifying an individual object, we demand 
only such definiteness as the interests at the time require. 
These may vary within wide limits. Hence what may 
appear as a complete individual at one time may seem 


Pie QUBS TION OFWV ALIDIY 47 


quite different at another. ‘Thus the desk may, to our 
preoccupied interests, seem only a vague object as regards 
color, size, position, etc., since all we may want as we 
write is a support; but at any moment our attention may 
be called to various details. “Ihe desk then becomes more 
definite. It is the same desk, of course, in both instances, 
but only because the different experiences are made to refer 
to the one object. Thus we see that validity in experience 
is synonymous with usability. 

At this point a vital and interesting question arises. 
What is the ultimate individual to which we refer our 
experiences? We may have various notions of an external 
object, each valid for a specific purpose, but the object 
itself remains the same; only our ideas about it change. 
This object is our standard of reference by which we test 
the validity of our varying conceptions. What is this 
object that we take to be real? If we can answer this ques- 
tion, the issue as to the reality of sense objects as univer- 
sals can be easily decided. Of one thing we may rest as- 
sured, the ultimately real object is itself an experience or 
it is nothing for us. In referring to it, we have not tran- 
scended experience. Hence the answer to our question must 
already have been given in our study of the concept of 
substance. 

In sense perception we may have a great variety of in- 
terests, mental preoccupations, degrees of alertness. The 
results will differ accordingly, even though the stimula- 
tions are practically the same. Or to use the language of 
ordinary life, we may view an object in a great variety of 
ways. Each shift of standpoint or of interest and atten- 
tion gives us a different experience. But we account for 
the differences by reference to subjective conditions such as 
those mentioned. We are sure that in any given percep- 
tion, if the mind were more attentive to the stimulations, 
or its interests were different, the object seen would take 
on more complexity and definiteness. Evidently, then, 
the real object must be that object which the mind holds 
before itself more or less vaguely, as being able to satisfy 


78 THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


all possible interests. This object is never existent in all 
its definiteness. It is simply an ideal of completeness, sug- 
gested by our ability to vary our apprehension in the ways 
mentioned. ‘This real object, then, is in a sense doubly 
mental, while at the same time it becomes the test or stand- 
ard of reality for all experiences that can be referred to it. 
It is emphatically a universal, and as such it has all the 
marks of relativity inherent in other universals. Both its 
fixity and its trustworthiness arise from the continuity 
and character of the stimulations conjointly with the con- 
stancy of our mental reactions thereon. 

Thus far we have been discussing the mental activity 
in perceiving physical objects. This activity is almost 
wholly subconscious. It provides only for our appre- 
hension of sense objects, not for our communicating with 
one another concerning them. As social beings we have 
a strong impulsion to tell others about our experiences. 
But to do this we must carry forward our mental activity 
beyond mere apprehension. In throwing our experiences 
into the form suitable for expression we construct what 
are known as judgments. ‘Thought as ordinarily under- 
stood is of this form. To judge is to have before the 
mind an object about which we assert something. 

It is well to note just what the mind does in thus 
preparing its sense objects for social treatment. Before 
we desire to communicate, our sense world is for us a 
continuum of objects that stand out before us as concreted 
unities with various characteristics. We do not think 
of separating the structure or the qualities or the states 
from the object; they are for us the object as a complex 
whole. When the states of the object change, the object 
itself is supposed to change; the old object ceases to be 
and the new object takes its place. We may find ourselves 
mistaken about some feature of the object, but in that 
case the false conception falls away and ceases to be a 
part of the objective texture, while the correct one takes 
its place. We are thus in immediate and continuous 
touch with reality. But as soon as we yield to the im- 


THE QUESTION OF VALIDITY 79 


pulse to tell others about this real world, we reconstruct 
the objects, separating them as thought-themes from the 
qualities or activities by which we would characterize 
them. The object as theme becomes the subject of a 
judgment; what we would say about it is set over against 
it, and constitutes the predicate. If the theme changes, 
what we have said about it may not be true. If it does 
not change, our words may nevertheless not be adequate 
to express the full reality of the subject. 

We may ask what the subject is in itself, and what 
the predicate can mean apart from the subject, and what 
the relation is that connects them. These may seem 
foolish questions; yet no less a thinker than F. H. Brad- 
ley, on the strength of such difficulties, does not hesitate 
to condemn the judgment or “‘relational way of thought,” 
as either meaningless or untrue. ‘The predicate, he con- 
tends, asserts what is or is not contained in the subject. 
In the first case the judgment is tautological; in the 
second, false. [his dictum apparently overlooks the intent 
of the judgment and its consequent artificial character. 
It is solely a means of expression. Hence for the reader 
or hearer it can be both true and informing, while for 
the writer or speaker, it is merely explicative and there- 
fore tautological. When an assertion is made, we prove 
or disprove it by practical tests, and have resulting truth 
orerror. In prejudgmental thinking we test for accuracy 
of observation, and have resulting apprehended object or 
illusion. In our further studies, we shall concern our- 
selves with the concrete world of experience rather than 
with the difficulties of adequate expression. 

2. THE WORLD AS COMMON TO ALL. Having 
sketched the modus operandi of sense perception as if it 
Were a matter of the individual's own construction and 
valid only for him, we now face a difficult problem per- 
taining to the nature of the common world—the world 
which we all know together, and which therefore cannot 


be the private possession of anyone. A student might 
1 Appearance and Reality, pp. 20, 33. 


80 THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


accept our analysis thus far, yet balk at the conclusion 
which seems to be involved, namely, that the common 
world is also a construction of individual minds in com- 
munication with one another. This conclusion seems 
absurd for several reasons. (1) Each individual mind 
has its own unique way of responding to stimulations; 
each has a different body of interests and habits—not to 
mention differing original capacities. “Thus every mind 
works in its own exclusive laboratory, and its products 
are known directly only to itself. (2) The common 
world is vast beyond all comprehension in space and 
time. What is the individual mind with its few years 
of experience over against the limitless ages of the past? 
What is its power of vision as compared with the infinite 
reaches of space? In every direction the infinities stretch 
out beyond our sense knowledge. ‘These vastnesses lose 
none of their reality by being out of our reach, they 
gain nothing by being known. (3) Whereas we are of 
little concern to this world (our appearing and disappear- 
ing seem to make no lasting difference with it), we must 
adjust ourselves to the world moment by moment in order 
to live. If all other grounds for rejecting the theory 
that the common world is the individual’s own construct 
should fail, there would be no denying the force of this 
one. What is so real in its own right as the stone over 
which we stumble? What is so absurd as the notion 
that the food we eat is idea? 

Let us now examine the validity of these objections. 
If our experiences are strictly exclusive must we not be 
solipsists in theory? Must we not consistently deny the 
very existence of the common world? From the view- 
point of theory such a world would seem to be a mys- 
terious aberration of the subjective life. This difficulty 
has troubled reflective thinkers since reflection became a 
serious enterprise. Solipsism is of course intolerable; we 
simply cannot believe it. A solipsistic philosophy is 
foredoomed to the rubbish heap. But what are we to do 
with the difficulties? If the problem were something new, 


SHE OGES DION OF VAIIDE TY 8] 


we might find temporary relief in one or another of the 
verbal solutions that have had their day. We might 
say with certain realists that there are two orders of reality, 
the one subjective and the other objective, and that these, 
while independent of each other, are kept in strict har- 
mony by a dominating power (preéstablished harmony). 
This theory looks good, but it does not work. ‘There 
is no way of bringing the hypothetical independent worid 
into the range of the known. Or we might hold with 
certain monadists that the selves or monads mirror the 
universe from their several points of view without trans- 
cending their private exclusive inner life. The universe, 
the common wozld, would then be each monad’s per- 
spective. Much the same difficulty besets this theory as 
the other. What is this universe that is mirrored? If 
it is the inner life of the monad, then there is no other. 
The two theories might be combined, as in H. Wildon 
Carr’s recent book, A Theory of Monads. In this theory 
the exclusive world of the self and the objective universe 
are viewed as manifestations of a primordial reality which 
Carr calls Life. But life is an abstraction, unless it is 
identical with what we have been calling a self. There 
is evidence in Carr’s book that he uses the two terms 
synonymously. In that case we have our starting point. 

The question we are facing is, How does the individual 
obtain a knowledge of the world that is common to all 
minds? With this question we are liable to confuse a 
different one, namely, How can we know a world that 
not only is infinitely beyond us in time and space, but 
is presumably independent of anybody’s knowing it? The 
assumed independence is what gives us trouble and con- 
fuses the issue. At the proper time we shall take up 
this second question, but not now, since it raises issues 
that we are not yet ready to consider fully. We revert, 
then, to our previous question, How can we know a world 
that is evidently apprehended by other intelligences in the 
same way as we apprehend it? How can we know our 
world to be a common-to-all world? Our world as our 


82 THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


own experience should apparently be strictly private and 
in no sense transferable. It is limited, relatively simple, 
and exists for us only in the act of experiencing it. On 
the other hand, the phenomenal world of social inter- 
course is shared by all, has no assignable limits in time 
or space, moves on in its course without regard to us, 
and compels us to adjust ourselves to it continuously as 
a condition of our very existence. How can we come to 
know this enveloping universe, and even make it the 
touchstone by which we test our individual experiences? 

In trying to answer this question we should not dodge 
any difficulty, nor yet permit ourselves unwittingly to 
make unwarranted assumptions. For instance, having set 
aside for the time the question of the objective world’s 
independence, we should not allow it to come back by 
way of the inference that because the world is common 
to all it is possessed by none. Whatever the common- 
to-all world is, we could not know it if it were essentially 
different from the individual's world. As a world of 
experience it must be the experience of a knower. Here 
is the crux of the problem. ‘The real difficulty does not 
lie in the vastness of the universe as compared with the 
orbit of our experience, nor in the minuteness of structure, 
nor in the apparent independence of our knowing it. We 
can reach its vastness by simply extending our experience 
world by means of legitimate inference. The puzzle as 
to what happened before the advent of man, or as to 
what goes on while we sleep, or as to the unreachable 
minuteness of the ultimate constitution, can be resolved in 
much the same way, provided we can explain the pos- 
sibility of a common experience world that is at the same 
time individual and unique—common yet incommunicable, 
shared yet strictly private. 

The apparent contradiction here indicated can be re- 
solved by remembering two points. (a) In all communi- 
cations of mind with mind, the media used, such as words 
and gestures, are general in meaning and require inter- 
pretation. As interpreted, they become a part of our 


THE QUESTION OF VALIDITY 83 


personal world. Thus in speaking of a rose, we may 
mention its color or the number of its petals or some 
other feature, yet in no case do our words convey exactly 
the definite content of our own experience. Likewise in 
history, the descriptions may be painfully minute, yet 
every item must receive an individual interpretation before 
it is known, and the interpretation necessarily depends 
on the mental prepossessions of the reader. (b) We test 
our interpretations by acting as if they were true and 
noting results. If these results are what we expected, the 
interpretations are taken to be correct. Very often we 
rely on testimony. A large percentage of our cherished 
beliefs have no other foundation; they would cease to be 
accepted if put to a real test. ‘They originated in our 
trying to reproduce the thought world of another from 
the generalized data that he was able to express in words. 
We may read accounts of places not yet visited by us, 
but when perchance we later see those places, we find that 
our second-hand notions of them need much revision. 
The information derived from the description was accurate 
only as to general features, those which language symbols 
are adequate to impart. Even the most crucial and ex- 
haustive tests do not cover the minutiae of another’s ex- 
periences. Our common world then is simply such general 
features of our experience world as can be represented by 
symbols. Or rather the common world is literally our 
interpretation of symbols in terms of our individual ex- 
periences. It never ceases to be our own and its common- 
ness lies in the power of interpretation. 

The possibility of communication rests in the fact that 
we are profoundly conditioned in sense experience by a 
complex of activities which are strictly independent of us. 
These conditions, as expressed in physical terms, must 
be so far mastered that they can be represented by conven- 
tional signs. People of widely different experiences may 
have considerable difficulty in telling each other about 
their several worlds. As social beings, we have all our 
lives been attentive to just those features of nature which 


84 THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


can be carried across to others by means of symbols. 
What is so unique as to be difficult or impossible to 
convey to others is persistently slighted, as relatively less 
significant. Society thus conventionalizes our world. 
Nothing is quite real to us that is not communicable. 
Yet it may well be that what we think we are expressing 
is very different from what our words actually mean to 
another. ‘Truth-telling is a fine art, never quite mastered 
by any of us. One thing is certain, our experience world 
is vastly richer than those generalized aspects of it which 
lend themselves to verbal or other expression. As life 
deepens, the unique and inexpressible becomes more sig- 
nificant. 

The confusion alluded to as complicating the question 
is practically inevitable in advance of critical reflection. 
At first, as a matter of course, we identify the common 
world with a supposed independent world, and all our 
experiences of adjustment to environment seem to confirm 
this identification. But this is because we think of the 
common or phenomenal world as the actual source of the 
sense stimulations. Since we do not experience these 
stimulations as such, they come into consciousness only 
as expressed in the mind’s ‘“‘figurative’’ response. We 
infer their presence to explain the controlled character of 
our experience. In looking for the source of this control, 
we spontaneously turn to the world about us. It does 
not at first occur to us that the world as we apprehend it 
is the result of stimulation, and therefore cannot, strictly 
speaking, be also the cause. Having fallen into the pit 
of this logical inconsequence, we proceed to establish our- 
selves there by concluding that our own experience world 
is really subjective and essentially different from the cosmic 
activities. When once we see that our mentally con- 
structed experience is the actual world as it appears to us, . 
and that through memory, imaginative forecast, and the 
critical use of inference we can, out of the available sources 
of information, build a universe without limit, our dif- 
ficulties begin to melt away. 


THE QUESTION OF VALIDITY 85 


But a serious embarrassment at this point is not pri- 
marily intellectual. It arises from the apparently mon- 
strous egoism expressed in our explanation. “The concep- 
tion that the cosmic universe, even as a common-to-all 
world, is the individual’s construct and has no other 
existence, so far as knowledge can reach, impresses one as 
bizarre, anthropomorphic, and absurd. ‘This impression 
is very strong with those who have given much attention 
to the natural sciences. In order not to lose our bearings 
entirely and fail of all coherent explanation, we need to 
review the argument again and again to see if we have 
not made some mistake. [here may perhaps be an alter- 
native explanation which will not so grievously offend 
both science and common sense. 

The current of sentiment against the foregoing expla- 
nation of the relation of the knower to the phenomenal 
world is so strong at present that certain writers reject 
the view even though they acknowledge that it is plausible, 
logical, and satisfying to the abstract intellect. They 
contend that when we come down to actual contact with 
physical nature and feel its mighty tides of energy, its 
resistless ongoings, and its indifference to our puny 
schemes, we see how absurd it is to think of ourselves as 
the makers of such a world. We should, forsooth, pre- 
serve our sanity, rest our case on the unequivocal evidence 
of our senses, and take the world presented in perception 
as just that which we do not construct but find. This 
common-sense view is apparently supported by the findings 
of scientific psychology. ‘The psychologist, by connecting 
mental processes with physical processes and working out 
a schematic parallelism between them, seems to do away 
with all initiative on the part of the mind. The mind, 
he says, or what we call the mind, is a product. Its 
capacities are strictly limited to the range of control exer- 
cised by the physical processes, especially the central 
nervous system. Other sciences also seem to support 
common sense. Do we not need to wait on nature, pa- 
tiently observe her ways, and persistently eliminate all 


86 THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


personal bias if we would find out her secrets? “The world 
is surely independent of our perceiving it, and that is the 
end of discussion. 

This argument derives its main strength from a complex 
of sentiments and established practical attitudes, and hence 
is difficult to meet. Sentiments are seldom amenable to 
argumentative treatment, and practical attitudes are set 
in our active nature. Both must be satisfied. Let us 
distinguish again between the world of possible experience 
and an assumed ontological world. “The world of possible 
experience is the cosmic universe filling space and time. 
The ontological world is not a matter of experience but 
is the source of stimulation that determines the character 
of our experience. Confuse these two and we have the 
theory that the objective world is independent of us. Keep 
them apart, as we should if we would think clearly, and 
the source of stimulation becomes a distinct problem, 
while the world of possible experience emerges as wholly 
response of the mind to the stimulation. Its reality is 
not to be questioned, but it is the reality of controlled 
response and not of a producing cause. As controlled 
response it takes on the character of independence for 
reasons that we shall be able to appreciate when we pass 
to our next topic, the nature of the source of stimulation. 

But we are not quite done with objections to our 
view. A much discussed conception of the intellectual 
life seems to throw us back upon common sense again. 
The question is raised whether the activity of the intellect 
does not carry us away from the real, the concrete world 
of sense perception and inevitably land us in mere abstrac- 
tions. ‘This idea is an old one, and has much to support 
it. On the strength of it, Bergson maintains that reality 
is found only in the sense data, the flow of impressions, 
and that the essence of the real is pure duration (con- 
tinuity of change). One of his English followers, Mrs. 
Karin Stephen, puts the case rather graphically as follows: 
“Suppose in a dark room which you expect to find empty 
you stumble against something. . . . You find it has a 


HE OURS GION OR VALIDUTY 87 


certain texture which you class as rather rough, a tem- 
perature which you class as warm, a size which you 
class as about two feet high, a peculiar smell which you 
recognize, and you finally jump to the answer to your 
question; it is a dog.’! Since each quality is classified 
and named, the sense data are generalized before they 
can be used in identifying the object, which thus comes 
to be at least two removes from reality. The dog is a 
double abstraction. By parity of reasoning all identified 
objects are likewise declared to be devoid of objective 
reality. 

This theory would apparently make the phenomenal 
world illusory, a fabrication based on the elemental ex- 
periences of the independent flow. While not the com- 
mon-sense view, it leaves the impression that the common- 
sense view is nearer the truth than is any intellectual 
construction. By considering sense objects as the tem- 
porary or moving equilibria in the activity of the cosmic 
energy, Bergson and his school seem to do justice to both 
the common-sense and the scientific view. But the phe- 
nomenal world of sense perception is not the invisible 
energy, not the ceaseless flow of events, but the objects 
that we see and apprehend. ‘The energy, the duration, 
the disappearing events exist for us only inferentially as 
aids in explaining the origin of our objective experiences. 
Bergson and his followers help to a satisfactory theory 
by drawing a sharp distinction between the constructed 
world and the varying impressions. But they are not 
unambiguous in treating the reality of the world as ex- 
perienced. Reality need not mean total independence of 
the mind. ‘The constituted world seems to be independent 
because its every feature is fashioned under compulsion. 
The independent reality is the source of the compulsion. 
This seems to be the conclusion to which we are logically 
driven. 

The strangeness of this conclusion is considerably re- 
lieved by the well-known phenomena of dreams, trance, 

1 The Misuse of Mind, p. 15 f. 


88 THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


and hypnosis. In such states the mind creates a world 
of objects that for the time being have the same kind of 
reality as our external world. We have no theory of 
dreams to exploit, but wish simply to point out again 
how marvelously dreams mimic the real world. However 
fantastic and incoherent they may seem to our waking 
mind, they undoubtedly seem real while we dream. So 
much of a piece with the world of our waking moments 
are many of our dreams that we should be likely to 
take them as real in the sense in which we look upon the 
outside world as real, but for our inability to find a place 
for them in the temporal-spatial context. It is well 
known that children and some grown-ups are unable to 
carry through the distinction between the dream and the 
phenomenally real, so that their world is a confused 
jumble of both. In dreams we may not only construct 
a physical environment vast in proportions and indefinitely 
minute in structure, but we can create a society in which 
each individual person acts in accordance with his own 
nature. We can ourselves engage one of these dream 
people in a discussion and have all the sensations of 
triumph or defeat. We can blunder and be corrected by 
a dream friend, we can forget and have him call the for- 
gotten item to mind. ‘There is nothing that we cannot 
experience as objectively real in the fabrications of a dream. 
The fabrications are illusory only from the viewpoint of 
our workaday world. 

That we can have a privately built world which is 
for us common to all, is not to be doubted. But is this 
common world as revealed in experience illusory? That 
does not follow. ‘The question is not, Is it illusory? 
but, What kind of reality has it? Science by methods 
of analysis and description reduces it to a process ever 
renewed, orderly, conforming to laws. But clearly this 
is not the whole story. At best the scientific conception 
is abstract, difficult to realize in imagination, and different 
from the world as revealed to our senses. Into the process 
we read thinghood and manifold qualities. The changes 


- 


ab OUESTON ORG VALIDITY 89 


that are supposed to constitute the process, we look upon 
as happening to the thing. If we are driven from this 
view by the logic of our thinking, we insist that at least 
force or energy is manifest in the process. “Things are 
forces, qualities are forms of activity, the common-to-all 
world is dynamic throughout. By this conclusion we 
seem to satisfy the scientific demand for continuous change 
and the common-sense demand for things and qualities 
that retain their identity in change. But unfortunately 
we find that science cannot use force or energy any more 
than it can the notion of material things, if by that is 
meant something distinct from the process itself. If the 
force or energy is a reality, it maintains itself through 
time; if the process is a reality, it continually vanishes 
and must be renewed from without. On the other hand, 
there is a contradiction in the idea of a process in which 
nothing remains self-identical through the changes that 
constitute the process. As no single event is the process, 
each event ceasing with its present—a vanishing moment 
—only the individual vanishing phase of the process at 
any one instant can exist. [hus the process disappears 
unless the mind puts into it something that gives it con- 
tinuity and permanence. Whatever we may call this 
permanent element, change infects it and logic resolves it 
into process. 

In spite of this logical solvent, all people—scientist 
and uneducated man alike—are sure that the outside world 
as a common world actually exists, even though they 
may not be able to construe the fact. The evidence of 
the senses is unimpeachable. Every experience of resist- 
ance adds to the strength of the conclusion. No amount 
of reasoning can set aside this ultimate conviction of 
common sense. But is there no way of actually meeting 
the difficulty? ‘To this end the following suggestions will 
be helpful. 

The conception of the world as a system of changing 
events in which nothing remains what it is at any moment, 
but everything vanishes in process, is a construction out 


90 THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


of the elementary experiences of a world of things. As 
a construction it is abstract, and yet for purposes of 
description it is valid. To call this phase of reality the 
phenomenal element, seems reasonable. But it has been 
shown that the thing or substance which is the primary 
fact in experience and which seems so essential to the 
possibility of a process must itself be as completely a 
construct as is the mechanical scheme. Both thing and 
process are thus manifestations; both are retained by us 
in our effort to understand our world, because each serves 
a distinctive purpose in the economy of thought. Each 
by itself looks reasonable enough, but each in relation 
to the other constitutes a problem. In other words, we 
can find a thinkable conception of the world only as we 
combine elements that seem to be mutually exclusive, but 
really answer to contrasting needs of the mind. This is 
admissible so long as we view the common world as the 
work of the mind. But if that world is taken to be 
extra-mental in origin, then these incompatible charac- 
teristics become contradictory; each excludes the other, and 
hence neither can be true. In short, the very possibility 
of a world of permanence and change is found only in 
the conditions of experience. ‘This statement brings us 
back to the conclusion already foreshadowed in the dis- 
cussion of the categories. [he phenomenal or common 
world is real, as real as any one wishes to think it, but 
its reality is in and for mind. It is real, not as a mere 
mental event like an imaginary creation or a passing 
fancy, but as having a determinate structure and as a 
product of activities which we can modify only to a 
limited extent and in accordance with fixed conditions. 

Our common world is not a product of intellection 
alone. In subtle ways the emotions enter into every con- 
struct and give it characteristic features. These features 
are not easily described. “The words we use in description 
have primary reference to intellectual aspects and carry 
only a derived emotional significance. “Thus we may say 
that the tone and color and esthetic warmth of our 


THE QUESTION OF VALIDITY 91 


world comes from the emotional infusion; but these 
words must of course be understood emotionally. Fur- 
thermore the world is a realm of goods to be appropriated 
and enjoyed; hence conative as well as emotional elements 
enter into its concrete meaning for us. ‘The intellectual 
construction is in itself an abstraction and not the real 
world at all. The world is a construct that reflects our 
moods and responds to our volitions. Later consideration 
of these extra-intellectual aspects of our world will bring 
us to a more satisfying solution of the difficulties we have 
been facing. We are ready now to press the question, 
What is the source of stimulation? 


CHAPTER IV 
THE SOURCE OF STIMULATION 


What is the source of stimulation? When we ask this 
long deferred question we enter the region of perennial 
conflict—the Armageddon of philosophy. The clash of 
theories is what we should expect when we reflect on the 
tremendous interests involved and the manifold possibil- 
ities of confusion and prejudice. An answer to our ques- 
tion would embrace by implication most of the deeper 
concerns of life and destiny. It behooves us, therefore, 
in approaching this battle ground of philosophy, to be 
unusually wary and critical. Here, especially, we should 
keep in mind the injunction, always pertinent, to accept 
no theory till it justifies itself against every possible 
attack, and hold it then only tentatively, subject to re- 
vision if new evidence should be forthcoming. Besides 
all the other difficulties we must encounter, we are com- 
pelled to reason from effects that we experience to the 
productive cause, which in the nature of the case we can- 
not experience. But the chief source of embarrassment 
is intellectual confusion, for that opens the way for 
theories that are intrinsically absurd. Such answer to our 
question as we may finally be able to give will have to 
come in installments, for only those parts of it that per- 
tain directly to the study of the sense world are here in 
place. Our question then is, What causes us to experience 
a spatio-temporal world of things that we take to be real 
in their own right? 

On the lowest plane of critical insight the persistent 
theory of common sense may seem plausible, namely, that 


IZ 


THE SOURCE OF STIMULATION 93 


the source of stimulation is the objective world itself. 
To illustrate the intellectual confusion that seems to sup- 
port this view, let us present some of the most appealing 
arguments for it. What evidence, one may contend, is 
better than that yielded by the practical tests mentioned 
in the foregoing discussion of validity? When we act 
on the assumption that things themselves are the sources 
of stimulation, we find an answering experience in har- 
mony therewith. Thus when we think of the radiator 
as the source of the pervasive heat, and on that assumption 
approach it, we experience direct sensuous confirmation. 
Moreover, must not the external object affect our senses 
in such a way that the agitation is communicated to the 
sensory nerves and carried by them to the brain cortex? 
If any of these media fail to function, there can be no 
external experience. Each sense organ yields its own dis- 
tinctive elements of information. Conjointly they declare 
the object. In holding this theory, we need not assume 
that the object we construct—admittedly incomplete and 
schematic—is the cause of our apprehending it. That 
is certainly absurd. But we should recognize the common 
distinction between the object as it happens to appear to 
us at any one moment and the real object that continues 
to exist in rerum natura, whether we see it or not. The 
real object is inconceivably complex and never can be 
experienced in its entirety; it is this real object that acts 
on our sense organs, causing us to have our experiences. 
The experiences may be as objective as we please, but 
back of all perceptive objects is the world of real sub- 
stantial things that affect one another and us in char- 
acteristic ways. This view of the connection between 
stimulation and response has the merit of making the 
objective world explain itself. We do not appeal to an 
unknowable transcendent cause, but find all the elements 
of our explanation within possible experience. Such 
are some of the considerations offered with zeal and con- 
viction to confound the critic of the common-sense realistic 
views. Let us examine them. 


94 THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


Starting with the last consideration, since it is general 
in its nature, we insist again that the real cause of an 
experience cannot itself be experienced. To distinguish 
the content as independently objective from the experience 
as mental in origin helps not at all. “The content of the 
experience is the experience viewed as having content. It 
is throughout construct; as such it is effect and never 
cause in the productive sense. As soon as we range the 
cause or source of stimulation on the side of experience 
we deny its causal character. “Thus, when we refer elec- 
trical phenomena to electricity as their cause, and mean 
thereby not merely to designate a general idea covering 
the manifestations, it is clear that we commit a bald con- 
tradiction in making electricity itself, as distinguished from 
electrical phenomena, an experienced object. The con- 
tradiction can easily be committed, however, owing to 
the persistent confusion of the two meanings of cause, the 
one being that of initiating or producing the effect, and 
the other that of being the phenomenal antecedent with- 
out which the effect does not take place. The latter 
meaning is strictly scientific; the former alone is appli- 
cable to our problem. The impulsion that we naturally 
feel to construct imaginatively whatever we think of as 
real lends plausibility to the confusion. “This impulsion 
is strong as life. It is deeper and more persistent than 
any of the ‘“‘drives’’ discovered by psychoanalysis. Its 
primal importance in our mental economy is evident. 
Moment by moment as long as the mind is active or life 
continues, the work of building our sense world goes on 
unceasingly. Not only is it the most constant, but it is 
the most spontaneous form of mental activity. To rea- 
son requires an effort of concentration, but to see a vast 
horizon full of objects constructed on the moment by the 
imagination, one only needs to open one’s eyes. Can we 
wonder, then, that so many people never consciously get 
beyond this form of picture-thinking? An entity that is 
unpicturable is for them non-existent. When, therefore, 
the force of logic compels us to conclude that a producing 


THE SOURCE OF STIMULATION 95 


cause of an objective world cannot itself be a part of that 
world, the picture thinkers are mystified rather than en- 
lightened. In the very act of distinguishing between the 
productive cause of our having objective experiences and 
the experiences themselves as effects, the tendency is strong 
to set the two forms of reality over against each other as 
mere contrasting parts of our common world, thus making 
them both of the phenomenal order. This confusion 
breeds many others and in the end makes a coherent philo- 
sophical view of experience impossible. 

It is interesting to note also how this imaginative 
tendency, when subject to criticism, works shrewdly to 
conceive of entities that may not actually be experienced, 
yet can be vaguely pictured. These entities (electrons), 
taken to be dynamic and always in motion, constitute 
an independent order of stimuli. From this order come 
the active elements of things as we know them in experi- 
ence. Such a conception of cosmic cause can easily be 
confused with the dynamic theory of nature advocated 
by science, and then takes on a factitious authority. Is 
it not scientific, and, therefore, is it not beyond any ex- 
cept scientific criticisms? But we need only try to make 
the real scientific conception meet the requirements of a 
productive cause, and science will rightly protest. The 
independent order of energetic entities must stand or fall 
on other than scientific grounds. It is a chimera born of 
confusion, and its only progeny is confusion worse con- 
founded. 

The legitimate distinction, already alluded to, between 
the external object as we happen to apprehend it and the 
object as it may at any other time be apprehended lends 
plausibility to the view we are criticizing. Since by a 
shift of interest we can have a new conception of the 
object without assuming a material change in the char- 
acter of the stimulations, we inevitably set up in the back- 
ground of our consciousness the ideal of an object that 
satisfies not only present interests but all possible interests. 
This ideal object is never apprehended in its entirety, just 


96 THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


because we can never have all the possible interests (or 
points of view) at the same time. It must therefore be 
thought as existing beyond all experience. In this way 
We arrive at the conception of a world in itself as the 
source of stimulations. The world in itself is the ghost 
that haunts philosophy. It has a locus, but nowhere in 
particular; it is active but changeless; it is without form 
and void—a figment of a much perplexed imagination. 

But what of the sense organs that mediate the percep- 
tion of an outside world? Are they not directly connected 
with the source of stimulation? As the actual means of 
transmission, are they not more than mere phenomenal 
objects, mere controlled objectifications of the invisible 
self? [hese questions raise the same issue in a slightly 
modified form. They mark another recoil of common 
sense from the conclusion that the source of experience 
cannot itself be experienced. We can do no more than 
insist again that the sense organs and all that constitute 
the physical body are for us what they are because of the 
stimulations we receive; they are altogether phenomenal. 
Whatever supports the conclusion that our experience 
world is a construct applies without abatement of cogency 
to the body as a part of that world. 

But, argues the realist, is not the body the source of all 
our feelings of resistance? Is it not the only means of 
affecting the outside world? Must it not therefore be 
causally real? Not in the productive sense. At least, 
there is no rational ground for thinking the body to be 
real in this sense. When we draw the distinction between 
the producing cause and the world as response, the body 
with all its functioning falls entirely on the side of re- 
sponse. Are then the sense organs, of sight, touch and 
the rest, mere ideas? Again, No. ‘The sense organs are 
no more mere ideas than are the other objects or parts 
of the external world. ‘They are the persistent and rela- 
tively uniform responses to equally persistent and uni- 
form stimulations received by the self from the source of 
stimulation. 


THE SOURCE OF STIMULATION 97 


Turning now to the opposite pole of thought on this 
question, we must contend that the source of stimulation 
is not mere activity—the actus purus of the Schoolmen— 
for that would be tantamount to denying that there is 
any source. Yet hidden in this apparently fatuous medi- 
eval doctrine is a truth that we shall need to urge again 
and again, namely, that whatever the source may be it is 
not activity plus something that is not active. The no- 
tion of a core of being that merely exists in permanent 
and blissful passivity must be given up, and for the ob- 
vious reason that in so far as it is passive, it is, as Hegel 
pointed out, the same as non-betng. It is, to adapt an 
expression of Huxley’s, a mere shadow of the mind’s 
groping, an evidence of unclear thinking. 

If, then, rational considerations preclude our finding 
the source either in the external world or in an independent 
order of activities, are we not forced to take an agnostic 
position? Not yet. We can, asa result of the argument 
thus far developed, positively conclude that the source is 
not in space or time, and is not a substance in the sense 
in which that term is ordinarily understood. Hence no 
characterization of the external world applies to it. Let 
us dwell on these assertions for a moment. 

The source is not in space nor has it any spatial prop- 
erties. This assertion follows, as we have contended, 
from the nature of space as the form of the phenomenal 
world. But may the source not be in a space of its own? 
What is to hinder its having a world of temporal-spatial 
experiences essentially like our own? Suppose it had, 
they would be its experiences, not ours, and the distinc- 
tion between it and its experiences would hold as it does 
in our own case. We do not think of ourselves as spread 
out over the phenomenal world that we apprehend. No 
more is the source of stimulation to be identified with 
any experience it may be supposed to have. One conse- 
quence of confusing the source with its experiences would 
be to destroy its unity. In assuming that the source must 
possess unity, we are not maintaining that there can be 


98 \ THE WORLD" OF) SENSE, PERGEP TION 


only one source in the universe for all possible forms of 
stimulation, but merely that whatever can be called a pro- 
ductive cause must have unity within itself. If neverthe- 
less we choose to ignore the demand for internal unity 
and affirm the spatial character of the source, we find that 
it thereby becomes as divisible and evanescent as anything 
else that occupies space. 

A similar line of reflection leads to the conclusion that 
this source is not in the time of the external world. If it 
has experiences, they may be organized as are ours in a 
temporal order; we cannot conceive of their not being 
so organized. But the source cannot be identified with 
that order, much less with any member of the series. It 
cannot, for instance, be thought as the first member, origi- 
nating the series, for in that case it would cease to be when 
the first member passed out of existence. This point is 
easily yielded, though it has been a favorite conception 
with those in the past who thought broadly but not 
clearly. They have pictured the universe as having been 
started ‘‘in the beginning’ with certain potentialities. 
Such a primeval power which created and then forgot or 
ceased to be cannot be the ever present, infinitely discrim- 
inative source of stimulation. 

But that this source is not the temporal order itself 
may not be so immediately evident. Does not the order 
alone endure? Events may come and go, but “‘duration’’ 
abides forever. It gathers up the past along with the 
present and bears them (or as Bergson would say, 
“gnaws’’) into the future. What could be simpler as an 
explanation? But that it could mislead anybody is a 
mystery. Either ‘“‘duration’’ is an unusual name for a 
power (Bergson! refers to it as possibly of the nature of 
consciousness) that works creatively; or it is made ade- 
quate from time to time because the theorizer supplies 
whatever it lacks at the moment. In either case duration 
is not mere lapse of time nor the order of temporal se- 


1 Creative Evolution, p. 10f. 


THE SOURCE OF STIMULATION 99 


quence; it is this order made over into an active entity 
that exists through time. 

Perhaps, however, if we could combine space with time 
and make them conjointly the source of all things, we 
might fare better. “This suggestion occurred to a promi- 
nent English thinker, S. Alexander, who in his Gifford 
Lectures? actually undertook to develop a theory of real- 
ity with only space-time as the original material. Instead 
of substance or power, space-time was in the beginning, 
and these two in one were Deity. Evidently the develop- 
ment of such a thesis is possible only as one reads into 
space-time the potentialities that are to be realized. By 
this method the supply of potentialities becomes exhaust- 
less. [hey must all be in the original space-time, else 
how could they ever become actual? ‘Thus the mind tricks 
itself. “To be potential is to be actual only ideally, that 
is, for the mind that anticipates. 

That the source cannot be in time in any construable 
sense is further evident from the now familiar truth that 
a cause, in order to be genuinely productive, must coexist 
with the entire series of its effects. “This means that we 
can find no ground for a present existence in that which 
no longer exists. “Io get the force of this conclusion, we 
need only apply it to ourselves as experiencing a temporal 
order. It is so true that we are never a mere member of a 
temporal series which we apprehend, that if there were 
but one temporal series and we completely grasped it, we 
should have what might be called a non-temporal exist- 
ence. ‘That is, we, as existing, should be distinct from all 
temporal characteristics. But in the world with which 
we have to do, there are innumerable series, only a com- 
paratively few of which we actually apprehend. We can- 
not rise above them all because we are finite and condi- 
tioned. Hence we seem to be in time in a sense not af- 
firmable of the ultimate source, which must coexist with 
and fully grasp every possible series. We get glimmerings 
of what this means when we consider the time-transcend- 

2 Space, Time, and Deity. 


100 THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


ing character of the self with reference to a purpose or ideal 
to be realized. Just as we are in this sense non-temporal 
in so far as we are real causes, so the source is non-temporal 
—or shall we say with Royce, ‘“‘time-inclusive’’ ?— 
throughout its being. This of course does not mean that 
the cosmic series is not in time for the source, but rather 
means that the source is not the cosmic series that is in 
time. 

From what has been said, it will hardly be necessary 
to argue that the source is in no sense a quality, or a mag- 
nitude, or a physical substance. “These concepts do not 
apply; they have a meaning only as characterizing the 
world of activities. But are we quite sure that the source 
is not a force or energy? What of the Spencerian prin- 
ciple of ‘“The Persistence of Force’? Perhaps no false 
explanation ever presented has been so persistently appeal- 
ingasthis one. It seems sosimple and adequate. Whereas 
a very little insight is sufficient to see that matter can- 
not meet the conditions, because taken by itself, it is inert, 
the case is different with force. By definition, force is 
just that which acts upon the senses, resisting, stimulat- 
ing, controlling. Every activity can be referred to it. 

But it does the work only by definition—which means 
that the work is done, and the name force is given to the 
mysterious cause. “This must remain a purely verbal ex- 
planation, unless the term force can be given such a mean- 
ing as exhibits its capacity to produce the results to be 
explained. All attempts to do this have signally failed. 
Force has revealed itself as a mere hypostatized abstrac- 
tion, an outcast idea, worse than useless, for it only mul- 
tiplies difficulties. For instance, if force were to be used 
as a principle of explanation, we should need as many 
forces as we have distinguishable activities in nature. A 
force that presumably explained one activity could not 
explain any other without becoming another force. The 
bond of unity would be wholly lacking. This means 
that we should be merely duplicating the complexity of 
our world without adding anything to our insight. What 


THE SOURCE OF STIMULATION 101 


is true of force is equally true of energy or electrons, con- 
sidered as entities that can exercise the causal function. In 
general, then, we conclude that the source of stimulation 
is neither a space-filling substance nor a temporal series, 
nor a force, nor anything that can possibly be a part of 
our experience world. What, then, is it? 

Herbert Spencer and many of his generation held that 
the ultimate source is unknowable. According to this 
way of thinking, our knowledge ends with the observed 
persistence of force in nature. ‘The ultimate ground of 
force is beyond human ken. But, as has often been 
pointed out, this unknowable is known to persist and to 
manifest itself as force. We know a thing by what it 
does. To say that we cannot know the power that mani- 
fests itself in every objective experience is to outrage intel- 
ligence. Nevertheless whatever we may say of the positive 
character of this source must be by way of inference. We 
never experience it in itself. This must be insisted upon 
here, though later we may have occasion to qualify the 
statement somewhat. ‘That it exists follows, as we have 
said, from the controlled character of our sense knowl- 
edge, as contrasted with the free play of fantasy. In try- 
ing to make out what it is, we need only be careful that 
our inferences are well grounded and inevitable. We must 
reason from the nature of the sense world to the nature 
of the cause. 

This method seems to contain elements of great hazard 
and uncertainty. How can we know that our inferences 
are the only possible ones? May they not simply mark 
the limits of our extremely limited intelligence, and be any- 
thing but objective truth? ‘The answer to such scepti- 
cism must be that whenever alternative conclusions appear 
equally plausible and we are unable because of our limited 
intelligence to find decisive ground of choice between 
them, we shall have to suspend judgment. But to reason 
from effect to cause is our only method of reaching any 
knowledge other than facts of coexistence and sequence. 
Take, for instance, the way we apprehend a fellow human 


102 THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


being. We become aware of his acts, his bodily move- 
ments, the sound of his voice, and such expressions—all 
of which we might tabulate and analyze till the end of 
time without the slightest evidence that they reveal a 
thinking, feeling, willing, conscious personality. “To reach 
him we must reason from effects, manifestations, to cause. 
If with the natural sciences we take this cause—-a human 
being—to be itself merely a series of effects appearing in 
temporal sequence, we must cease to look upon it as cause; 
it can no longer be to us a human being. But whenever 
we would transcend the mere arrangement of events and 
penetrate to their significance, our data are always effects 
and all explanations point back to causes. 

What must we add to observational data in order to 
reach conclusions concerning their cause? We must in- 
terpret the data by reference to what we know about our 
own nature. The key is within us. All that is outside 
is effect; nowhere out there do we find a cause, except in 
terms of selfhood. “The cause must be a power that acts 
essentially as we act when we accomplish a change in our 
environment. If there is danger in this kind of reasoning, 
we need not let it trouble us until confronted by it. We 
may be sure that our choice is between this method and 
a method that can yield no positive results. Hence in 
trying to ascertain the nature of the ultimate source of 
stimulation by reasoning from manifestation back to what 
could cause it, we follow the only effective method. 

Our first conclusion is that this source must possess 
unity. This follows from the fact that the world as 
known is orderly, or at least capable of orderly arrange- 
ment into a unitary whole. All sense stimuli must come 
from the same source. We cannot think through the pos- 
sibility of different independent sources. If they harmon- 
ized with one another they would not be independent, 
and if they did not harmonize the result would be chaos. 
The unity of the world then argues the unity of the ulti- 
mate source. Some have thought to question this conclu- 
sion by pointing out that the unity is purely subjective. 


THE SOURCE OF STIMULATION 103 


But they cannot do justice to the fact of a common-to-all 
world. If there were one source of stimulation for you 
and another independent one for me, we should live in 
two different systems. Intelligent codperation between us 
would be impossible unless an overruling power made the 
two sources act with reference to each other. In that 
case, the overruling power would be the ultimate source. 

This conclusion is closely connected with another 
which seems equally valid, though not quite so self-evi- 
dent. ‘The orderliness of nature, its manifest amenability 
to intelligence, points to the intelligence of its source. The 
only alternative is unintelligence. We need not here take 
account of the attempted distinction between intelligence 
and super-intelligence. “This distinction pertains to a dif- 
ferent issue, namely, whether the supreme Intelligence is 
discursive like our own or essentially unique. The ques- 
tion before us is whether the ultimate source knows or 
does not know what it is doing. “The evidence of intelli- 
gent action is adjustment to an end. ‘The stimulations as 
the antecedents of all sense knowledge are perfectly ad- 
justed to our intelligence, not only to the individual but 
to all alike. This adjustment is such that each mind 
reacting to the stimulations in its own way produces an 
experience world harmonizing with the experiences of all 
other minds. This constitutes our objective world. 

When one seriously and in detail tries to account for 
these very evident facts by the assumption that the cause 
is blind—not merely a stupid or half-witted being, but a 
blind, unconscious somewhat—one begins to realize the 
emptiness and fatuity of the attempt. “The absurdity is 
as boundless as the universe itself. “his conception would 
hardly have needed mentioning, except that some who 
ought to know better think they find a foothold for the 
theory of unintelligence in the notion of a persistent force, 
which has all the characteristics of a supreme intelligence 
and yet no knowledge of what it is doing. As already 
noted, this is merely a mischief-making abstraction—the 
hypostasis of force. A force that is less than a self, less 


104 THE WORLD OF SENSE PERCEPTION 


than an intelligence, can have no unity. In generalizing 
the forces into a unity, we merely perform a feat of classi- 
fication which means nothing for actuality. 

While these considerations seem conclusive, they are 
supported by many others, among which are the follow- 
ing. (1) A real cause, as we have seen, must be one that 
maintains itself through the time process in which its 
effects appear. So far as we know, only intelligence can 
do this. We know ourselves as abiding through our ex- 
periences. [he act of memory by which we bring our 
past representatively into our present is the act which re- 
veals ourselves as having a continuing existence. It is not 
thinkable that there should be any other kind of perma- 
nence than the permanence of the self and of the substan- 
tial world as apprehended by the self. Either, then, we 
must grant intelligence to the ultimate source of experi- 
ence, or abandon hope of telling what it is. 

(2) This ultimate source must somehow maintain a 
policy of development such that when all its effects are 
taken into account, the world will seem to the scientific 
student to be actually moving toward a goal. ‘This con- 
sideration is simply carrying forward the argument from 
order, by recognizing the generally accepted hypothesis of 
cosmic evolution. It amounts to saying that as intelli- 
gence is the only principle of order we know, the more 
order, the more intelligence. “To have a world that is 
amenable to orderly arrangement is one thing, but to be 
able to think of it as a cosmos moving toward some “‘far- 
off divine event,’’ and not a mere drift, not mere “cosmic 
weather,’ is something far more significant. “The Power 
working through us to cause our world to be proceeds 
according to a plan of the whole. 

(3) We find that the results of this Power's activities 
as now apprehended, that is, as far as human knowledge 
has been able to reach, have conserved, and are able to a 
much greater degree to conserve, human purposes. This 
consideration is merely mentioned here, since its further 
development belongs to a later stage in our discussion. Its 


THE SOURCE OF STIMULATION 105 


bearing on the present issue is evident. All the goods of 
life, physical, social, zsthetic, religious, are provided for 
us by this Power. These goods are all conditioned; but 
when the conditions are fulfilled, the goods are ours. 
Their misuse entails loss or injury. 

In short, the Power that codperates with us in con- 
structing our world must be credited not only with per- 
sistence, orderliness, and forward-looking volition, but 
with proceeding in such a way as to build up, conserve, 
and enrich human life. The phenomena of death, the 
possibility of the universe’s “running down”’ or becoming 
unfit for human existence, the law of the jungle that holds 
in the sub-human world and all too much among human 
beings—these and other apparently inescapable ills raise 
serious questions which must be faced before the conclu- 
sion can be drawn that the ultimate Power is wholly good. 
If not evidently good, he is not evidently intelligent. The 
connection is such that we cannot really construe the pos- 
sibility of an intelligence that is evil. Such a being would 
perpetually stultify and thwart himself by injuring or 
destroying his own handiwork. ‘This a priori argument 
does not settle the issue; we must face the facts of experi- 
ence directly and not shrink from the worst of them. But 
the further discussion will have to be postponed till the 
general unfolding of our philosophical view has pro- 
gressed somewhat. 


PARI 
THE WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


CHAPTER I 


GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS OF SCIENTIFIC 
KNOWLEDGE 


In considering the structure of our sense world we had 
to touch upon many questions that pertain especially to 
the world as science reconstructs it. “The two worlds are 
alike in being the work of thought. ‘The general prin- 
ciples of organization are the same in both. But the 
world of scientific thought is more elaborate. The task 
of science as an intellectual enterprise is to bring order 
and harmony into the sense world by thorough applica- 
tion of thought laws. In taking up the study of the 
resulting structure and its significance for philosophy, we 
shall keep in closest touch with the world of sense. As 
concrete experience is the thing to be explained, we shall 
have to return to it frequently in order to test our conclu- 
sions. 

At every step of our approach to the study of scientific 
construction we shall encounter misconceptions and con- 
fusions that need to be cleared away. Many of these false 
views have, through long acceptance, become so entrenched 
in popular thought as to seem essential truth. Yet they 
must give way under criticism. Their greatest bulwark 
is mental inertia. People not only rest satisfied behind 
traditional beliefs in spite of destructive criticism but 
strengthen their defenses, combatting the rationalization 
of experience lest they lose their cherished falsities. Be- 
cause of this tendency to hold what one has, even though 
it may be of inferior validity, our best course in over- 
coming false conceptions is to move forward in a con- 


106 


SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE 107 


structive way and attack popular misconceptions only 
when they lie athwart our path. 

The analysis of sense perception reveals a fairly complex 
mental activity. But as this constructive work by the 
mind is largely subconscious, thinkers of a certain type 
attempt to deny its presence in sense perception. ‘They 
would assume that objects are somehow given. ‘These 
attempts have signally failed. “There is no way of pro- 
viding for the possibility of experience without recogniz- 
ing the mental activity that we have been studying. There 
might well be a difference of opinion as to the number 
of ultimate principles, since that is a matter of analysis, 
but their presence in sense knowledge cannot be gainsaid. 

The mental activity that gives us our sense world is, 
as we have said, essentially the same as the thinking pro- 
cesses by which we work over our perceptions into elabo- 
rated knowledge. It is the same mind, whether working 
subconsciously under the influence of stimulations, or con- 
sciously impelled by ideas and interests. In both fields 
we see the mind fixating, arranging, and weaving into a 
connected whole. Hence our study of elaborated knowl- 
edge will simply carry forward the issues started in the 
study of sense knowledge. 

We see how, when our senses are alert, impressions 
forming a continuous succession bid for our attention. 
They cease with their moment of activity, unless the mind 
arrests them and gives them relative permanence. It is 
important to note how a selective process, begun before 
the mind is aware of it, is continued within the mental 
realm in the attempt to reduce the infinite variety of the 
external world to a manageable simplicity. Of the sun’s 
rays, for instance, that flood the depths of space, a portion 
reach the earth, a comparatively few pass into the eye, and 
of these only the ones that arrest our attention or cause a 
mental response enter directly into the making of experi- 
ence. ‘Ihe perceived world that results is our sole basis 
for determining what the macrocosm is. “The mind has to 
find its way as best it can. Hence it proceeds to further 


108 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


simplifications; the world as revealed in sense perception 
is still too complex. 

The method of procedure is well known. When im- 
portant similarities are noticed among our objects, we 
group them into a class, and the mind constructs a simpli- 
fied model to stand for them all. This substitute, more 
or less vaguely defined, is our class concept or universal. 
It may serve merely as a rule for dealing with the mem- 
bers of the class, or it may on occasion be utilized as a 
guide in constructing an object, When thus utilized, it 
becomes an ideal to be realized. As soon as our universals 
are satisfactorily formulated, they, rather than the in- 
dividuals of elementary experience, become the centers of 
interest. “They thus tend to take over the characteristics 
of the reality that properly belongs to the separate objects 
to which they refer. 

They are, in fact, as real as the material objects, but 
in a different sense. Both are valid for experience, and nei- 
ther is more than that. Validity makes our mentally con- 
structed things real, and validity imparts reality to our 
universals. “[he process of concreting or substantializing 
begins as soon as we have the incipient experiences (sense 
data) out of which we fashion individual things, and it 
continues so long as we find concepts that prove service- 
able in grouping or otherwise connecting sense objects. It 
is true that sense objects have tangible qualities and con- 
cepts do not; but this difficulty is met by distinguishing 
two kinds of objective realities, one of things and one of 
essences. Essences (universals more or less substantialized) 
are real up to the measure of their serviceability. 

When we are interested not so much in objects as in 
their relations one to another and their reciprocal changes, 
we proceed in a slightly different way, and get what we 
call a law rather than a universal, though the law is of 
the same nature as the universal. Both are rules. The 
one is a rule for identifying individual objects as belonging 
to a class, the other, a rule for dealing with objects as re- 
lated to one another, Just as things change continuously 


SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE 109 


and every change has characteristic features that differen- 
tiate it from all others, so the relations that things sustain 
te one another are unique and never duplicated. The re- 
lations of things in our sense world are in this respect 
like the permutations of an infinite number of elements 
supposedly disconnected; but unlike such permutations, 
they fall into easily recognizable groups based upon simi- 
larity. Within each group these resemblances suggest 
some sort of connection. [he things vary together in 
some definable way. ‘The statement of this connection 
when sufficiently inclusive is called a law of nature. While 
the law gets its validity by being exemplified in particular 
situations, the situations themselves are vastly more com- 
plex than the law indicates. Hence the connection ex- 
pressed by the law has the same sort of validity as have 
universals, and tends like them to make the connection a 
part of our real world. Both universals and laws of con- 
nection are of such value in understanding and manipu- 
lating nature that they command our interest; the individ- 
ual thing yields first place in point of significance, until 


we have to make a new test of our law. In fixing our, 


attention on the laws of connection we get the conception 
of things as having an environment which determines or 
at least sustains fixed relations to their activities. The 
between ‘objects and their environment. The scientist is 
interested both in objects as related spatially and in the 
succession of events. Objects are objects only because 
they embody a temporal series of appearances. ‘To fore- 
cast the future of a given situation we must of course 
know the laws of its development in the past. Hence the 
sciences, whenever practicable, have made the historical 
approach central in the study of nature. This is espe- 
cially true of the biological sciences. [hat the philogen- 
etic history of animal or plant forms can be made the 
basis of their systematic treatment was a discovery of pro- 
found significance. Similarities and divergences were thus 
explained as indicating the closeness or remoteness of blood 


110 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


relationship. Varieties and species and even genera were 
seen to be continually, though slowly, in the making. 
The explanation of how these changes take place, the 
influences that bring them about, constitutes the theory 
of evolution. 

If now we should ask of laws as we asked of univer- 
sals, Are they real? the first answer would probably be 
that they are not. We certainly distinguish, for instance, 
the growing tree from the law of its growth. We are sure 
that the law is not a part of the material tree. Yet if we 
let our thoughts dwell on what the law apparently does 
in controlling the cycle of changes in the tree, we find no 
difficulty in attributing to it a power that can belong only 
to an external reality. Laws are as real as essences, and 
both are as real as physical things, though only for the 
thinker. ‘They are real in a deeper sense than are physical 
things, since they hold over and have a sort of perma- 
nence, while things are evanescent, ever passing into some- 
thing else. Out of things, universals, and laws, the mind 
constructs its ordered world. ‘The practical value of the 
selective simplifications thus accomplished is beyond esti- 
mate. [hey are the condition of social intercourse and 
even of knowledge itself. “They are more than the con- 
dition, they are the very structure of knowledge, and as 
such are the greatest achievement of the human mind. By 
means of them we attain what we proudly call the truth, 
as distinguished from mere matters of fact. 

Truth, then, pertains especially to the organization and 
structure of experience. [his statement means not that 
matters of fact may not be true, or that truths may not 
attain to the status of matters of fact, but rather that we 
advance from the bare apprehension of facts to the grasp 
of truths as we view the facts in their interrelation and 
form them into coherent wholes. Antecedent to the ap- 
prehension of the individual object or event we doubtless 
have, as psychology teaches, a vague consciousness of a 
whole that includes the object or event as a not yet iso- 
lated phase. But even such a vague consciousness is the 


SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE 111 


work of mental construction, though we are entirely un- 
conscious of the activity involved. Then follows the 
separation of portions of this mass into definite objects 
such as constitute our external world. When these are 
studied in their relations one to another, they yield the 
knowledge we call truth, and thereby make practical life 
possible. 

Because the isolable fact lies intermediate between the 
relatively unorganized complex of hazy psychic content 
and the organized whole of experience, the distinction be- 
tween fact and truth cannot in any given situation be 
sharply drawn. ‘The one passes into the other by insen- 
sible degrees. “The more we reflect on the subject, the far- 
ther back we carry the idea of truth, until we reach the 
most elementary awareness of an outside world. Every- 
where along the line of advance we find evidences of relat- 
ing activity. Inasmuch as we start with an ill-defined 
scheme of the whole which seems to be merely given, and 
within this scheme construct our objects by a process of 
isolation, we might make out a case for the proposition 
that the individual object is an abstraction while the con- 
crete reality is the truth in its articulated completeness. 

But not all supposed truth is true. How do we differ- 
entiate the true from the false or inaccurate? We put it 
to a practical test. We ask, Does the conception help us 
to understand the group of facts to which it refers? Can 
we act upon it and secure the anticipated results? Does it 
contribute to our ability to control events in the world 
about us? Thus we presuppose an objective order in our 
sense world—an order that we apparently do not make 
but discover. The discovery, however, is a making, since 
the order could not exist for us if we failed to take all the 
steps of analyzing, arranging, and formulating involved 
in our idea of order. The point of special interest is that 
all knowledge implies orderliness. Evident in the most 
rudimentary consciousness of an outside world, it is also 
the very essence of rationality. Truth as content is simply 
the order that proves itself in practical life. 


112 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


Order has two meanings which should be distinguished. 
It may mean logical necessity and refer to connections of 
implication. Such order is exemplified in a mathematical 
system, where every element has a determinate place de- 
pending on the nature of rationality. “The second mean- 
ing pertains to the external world as having observed vari- 
ety of content variously related. In this latter sense order 
as contrasted with disorder means simply such an arrange- 
ment of the details in any situation as meets our needs or 
answers to our expectations at the time. All disorder is 
relative, and as Bergson! rightly maintains, nowhere in 
the realm of experience is there an absence of order of 
some sort. Even chaos is vaguely apprehensible only as 
an order not yet mastered. To think at all is to set in 
order, that is, to select, correlate, connect. Ihe more we 
think, the more significant become to us the order and con- 
nections among things. 

Thus every consideration of convenience and necessity 
contributes to the mind’s drive toward system. ‘Theoreti- 
cally there is no resting place for the mind short of such 
an exhaustive and harmonious organization of our sense 
world as will completely define every object therein by 
its relations to the other members of the system. No one 
has ever attained this goal, nor can any one ever hope to. 
In practice we stop the work of organizing and system- 
atizing when we get tired or lose interest, that is, when 
we satisfy our practical needs. “This work of classifying 
and relating is the chief enterprise of the natural sciences. 

We are now ready to characterize the kind of truth that 
is the goal of scientific endeavor. It is systematic, descrip- 
tive, objective, practical. “These characteristics indicate the 
scope and limitations of the scientific field. We are inter- 
ested now especially in the relation of scientific knowledge 
thus characterized to the question of the real in the objec- 
tive world. A further word about each of these four 
characteristics. 

‘The scientific ideal, if it could be realized in full meas- 

1 Creative Evolution, p. 220 ff. 


SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE ELS 


ure, would hardly be looked upon as real apart from ex- 
perience. Its reality would still consist in its validity and 
effectiveness in dealing with the objective world. Never- 
theless we succeed in working so many of the scientific 
conceptions into our common-sense world that no one 
can accurately separate the two. ‘There seems no limit to 
our capacity to take over the accredited and accepted re- 
sults of scientific thought and make them a part of objec- 
tive reality. “This process of absorption of thought mate- 
rial from science is steadily transforming our conceptions 
of the nature of the real. Among other things, it is forc- 
ing us to recognize not only the infinite complexity of a 
world built out of electrons and protons, but also the 
thoroughly dynamic character of every part of nature. 
We find increasingly difficult the task of holding fast to 
the substantial character of the external world while in- 
corporating the intellectual constructions of science. 
Reality is so vitally connected with both constructions— 
the common-sense and the scientific—that neither can be 
dispensed with. We must somehow harmonize them. 
In other words, our conception of reality must admit of 
continuous transformations in accordance with the de- 
mands of scientific thought, and at the same time allow 
for the substantial verities of sense perception. ‘The real 
must be for us an achievement, with various stages and 
degrees—not static but growing. 

We make progress toward this end by recognizing the 
instrumental character of scientific constructions. As their 
serviceability in dealing with nature—forecasting and con- 
trolling the course of events—determines their quality as 
truth, the aim is to attain the maximum of simplicity and 
definiteness. The structure should be transparent to 
reason, that is, every part should be seen in its relation to 
every other. In short, the product should be systematic 
throughout. This ideal is not in the least invalidated by 
the failure of science to realize it. All scientific attainment 
is in the direction of this goal. We may even catch sug- 


114 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


gestions of the goal itself as we consider some of the boldest 
generalizations of recent physics and chemistry. 

In passing we may ask, Are the results of scientific 
effort less real because of being serviceable? Does their 
instrumental character take them out of the realm of reality 
and make them mere intellectual tools, expressive of 
human limitations? Or is external reality after all a sys- 
tematic whole? Does it actually consist of an infinite 
nexus, in which every element is related to every other? 
Science is not concerned to answer this question. But as 
students of philosophy, we must in due time find an 
answer that holds or else give up our problem; for our 
main interest is in attaining an insight into the nature 
of reality. 

That the entire process of selection and organization 
characteristic of scientific work is descriptive only can 
hardly be questioned. Science takes the materials of sense 
perception, eliminates as far as possible any inaccuracy of 
observation, analyzes them to find the simpler and more 
common elements of which they are composed, searches 
for the elementary laws of their composition, studies en- 
vironmental conditions, and formulates results in laws of 
connection. This is, throughout, description. If by 
chance or inadvertence the zealous investigator ventures to 
transcend the limits of description and pronounce on the 
nature of reality as such, his more careful colleagues are 
quick to discount this part of his work as extra-scientific. 
As purely descriptive, scientific results are characterized by 
their strict externality. “he word internal has no meaning 
for science except as that which can be known by becom- 
ing external. ‘This is true even of mental states. They 
are scientific material only in so far as they can be repre- 
sented graphically, that is, set forth as capable of being 
sensuously apprehended. ‘This explains also why the self 
is non-existent for scientific thought, or if recognized as an 
entity is treated as a problem which can be solved only by 
a process of resolution into elements open to inspection. 
However penetrative the analysis and however comprehen- 


SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE 115 


sive the generalization, science never gets beyond the sur- 
face features of experience. he spatially internal becomes 
external by being thought as a part of the system. 

We may ask again, Is this externalism a limitation of 
science, or does it tell the whole story of objective reality? 
Is the world of sense perception pure externality? Is its 
nature exhausted by being perceived? Is it pure system, 
pure mechanism, pure process? Science answers again that 
nothing else can be included in the scientific scheme of 
truth. Many scientists incline to the opinion that the sci- 
entific limit of knowledge is the absolute limit, and that 
human intelligence cannot transcend it. We shall need to 
move cautiously in dealing with this issue. Science must 
have full authority within its field. Reality must be sys- 
tem, must be mechanism in so far as it is intellectually 
apprehensible. But may it not be more? Must it not be 
if it is real? “These of course are philosophical questions 
and need not trouble the scientist, whereas they constitute 
our main problem in so far as external nature is concerned. 
They will be considered in due time, but are referred to 
here by way of suggesting how much of every science 
(except pure mathematics) is strictly speaking extra- 
scientific. “The man of science may rightly claim to keep 
close to the realities of nature. But his realities are always 
more than descriptions. He fills in, rounds out, completes 
his schematic results by interpreting them in terms of sub- 
jective interests. Events as happening in the space-time 
continuum he treats as things that change internally and 
in their space relations one with another. [hus he be- 
comes a philosopher against his will. 

Science reduces everything to pure externality because 
it is strictly objective in its attitude toward the world of 
possible experience. Its objectivity is its strength. All 
its triumphs have been due to its strict adherence to the 
objective viewpoint. “To abandon that would be to sac- 
rifice both clearness and cogency, in fact everything of 
scientific value. Since science has a right to claim the 
entire field of the knowable as its very own, may we not 


116 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


plausibly conclude that the objective viewpoint is the only 
one that can yield accredited knowledge? Whatever we 
would study or learn about, whether things, essences, re- 
lations, or persons, we set over against ourselves to view 
either with the physical or the inner eye of the analyzing 
mind. This is evidently the same issue as was raised in 
the preceding paragraph. We break up the objects into 
their component parts and study the modes of their activ- 
ity, confident that both the elements of analysis and the 
changing states are more than subjective constructions. 
What that something more is cannot be ascertained by 
observation, for observation can yield only further de- 
scriptive data. The strict use of the objective method 
must, therefore, leave us quite detached from the realities 
of experience. The reference to reality is something 
additional. 

After all that has been said, we need not dwell upon 
the practical character of scientific truth. Its practicality 
is no more a limitation than is the objectivity of scientific 
method. To say that such knowledge is practical is to 
say that it can be tested by experience. “[he much bandied 
statement of the Pragmatists that what works is true and 
what does not work is not true, holds universally, just 
because it is tautological. ‘Truth is practical or it is not 
truth for us. An objector might ask, Do not our ideas 
have to correspond to an objective or extra-human stand- 
ard? Before we answered this we should need to tell 
what we mean by objective, and in what sense ideas corre- 
spond. ‘The standard must be set up by the mind itself 
or it cannot be used, and its selection depends on its appro- 
priateness to the end in view. The idea can correspond to 
it only with reference to some feature which is at the time 
interesting to the mind. ‘There is no such thing as corre- 
spondence in general. Hence both the selection of a stand- 
ard and the correspondence are ruled by practical motives. 
When we advance beyond the workability tests of sense 
experience, the appropriate test is that of coherence or con- 
silience. [his requires that truths be consistent internally 


SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE BZ, 


and in relation to one another, so that together they may 
form a harmonious whole. Evidently this test is also 
practical, though more especially for the higher intellectual 
realm. 

But it is a significant fact that scientific truth is rarely 
found in its chemically pure state except as mathematical 
formulae. The generalizations always refer to the world 
of concrete things and the assumption is always made that 
this thing world to which the law applies has some sort 
of independent existence. “lake, for instance, such a gen- 
eralization as Boyle’s law concerning the pressure of gases. 
With mathematically accurate data bearing upon the vol- 
ume, temperature, and pressure of a confined gas, the physi- 
cist can demonstrate the law. When explaining the law 
and its application, the physicist very naturally refers to 
the forces at work in causing the pressure, and to the mole- 
cules as free to move. Now evidently all reference to forces 
and molecules transcends description, as we have said, 
unless the terms are used as mere convenient modes of 
expression. Even their convenience rests on an unexpressed 
if not wholly unconscious assumption that they actually 
mean an existing world of entities. 

In short, while science aims at practically usable descrip- 
tion of events, it must transcend description in order to be 
intelligible. This is nothing against science, but it points 
to the habitual and even necessary use of another type of 
explanation in dealing with concrete experience. For con- 
venience we may call this other type interpretation. The 
two types are related, though distinct, at least in theory. 
They need to be carefully distinguished at this point. In 
passing from the one to the other we pass from the strictly 
scientific attitude to the philosophic. Science may make its 
own interpretations and treat them with indifferent con- 
cern until the philosophical question of ultimate validity 
is raised. “Then the attempt to answer the question carries 
us beyond science. 

Scientific description, as we have said, should be not 
only accurate and unbiased, but impersonal. As imper- 


118 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


sonal it must practically ignore the connection of the de- 
scribed event or object with the observer. In so far as 
this cannot be ignored the scientist must find ways of 
making due allowance for the personal equation and cor- 
rect the results accordingly. The description must of 
course represent a point of view; but points of view may 
be varied, and thus cover all the superficial aspects of a 
situation. Nevertheless all description involves the selec- 
tion of material, a clearly defined perspective, a distribu- 
tion of emphasis dependent on the attitude of the observer 
or describer, and such other controlled treatment as points 
to the ineradicable presence of subjective factors. Every- 
thing in the description is determined by the dominant 
interest. Change the interest and the description is modi- 
fied accordingly. But not only can no one description 
adequately set forth the object; all possible ones combined 
fail of adequacy, when judged by the test of: ultimate 
concreteness. Studied accuracy and minuteness of detail 
only reveal how much in the object is left unexpressed. 
The concrete object stands over against the catalogue of 
qualities as something quite apart. ‘The difficulty is not 
that there is always a vast residuum of complexity, but 
that no description as such tells you anything at all except 
as you read into the words used a bit of your own experi- 
ence, and this is more than description. 

So long as we maintain the strict limitations of descrip- 
tion, the object is described as having a place in a world 
beyond the self; yet back of every description is the de- 
scriber with his limited capacities and interests, and his 
ability to change his interests indefinitely. Every new 
interest develops a new insight, a new grouping of signifi- 
cant distinctions, new meanings and values. From this 
viewpoint, the viewpoint of the experiencing subject, the 
reality apprehended is just what it appears to be at the 
time to the experient. At one time it may be rich in quali- 
ties sharply distinguished, at another, a mere blur of un- 
differentiated material—the same reality, yet not the same; 
different in every particular. 


SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE avg 


But does not scientific description imply all that is here 
asserted of interpretation? We have the same diversity, 
the same intellectual limitations, the same feeling that 
reality is indefinitely beyond our apprehension. Why, 
then, attempt to draw a sharp line between description and 
interpretation, as if they were somehow opposed? In 
answer to this very reasonable question, we would point 
out again that the contrast becomes especially significant 
only when the nature of the real is the problem before us. 
While the real is referred to in every description, it eludes 
us when we become critical. We must, therefore, differen- 
tiate the two contrasting elements in ordinary description 
and note what belongs to description because of its dis- 
tinctive point of view and what is assumed as giving sig- 
nificance to the description. 

The assumed element in all description is the meaning 
of the object for the knower. In interpretation this mean- 
ing is brought to the foreground and identified as the 
reality underlying the description. The close affinity of 
meaning with the idea of substance is evident. “he mean- 
ing holds together in a unity a manifold of experiences. 
It does this not by the laws of association nor by the like- 
ness of the physical characteristics to one another, but by 
the insight that they belong together in a purposive whole. 
When the meaning changes, the united experiences fall 
apart and a new combination is effected. Meaning is the 
objective side of purpose; it answers the question, What 
is the thing good for? ‘To understand, then, the philo- 
sophical significance of interpretation, we have only to 
imagine all meaning eliminated from our world. Not 
only would those indescribable features of reality which 
reflect our moods have to go, but whatever else is essential 
to the existence of an objective world. Individual things 
would have to be surrendered, for they are integral entities 
only because they conserve a purpose. It is the purpose 
that holds the parts together. Change the purpose and 
the combination changes. What would be an individual 
from one point of view would. be part of a larger whole 


120 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


or would be itself an aggregate from some other point of 
view. Thus a house is a whole, a unit of interest, when 
we are thinking of a place to dwell in; it is a manifold of 
parts if we are thinking of the materials entering into its 
construction; and it is a part of a larger whole when the 
neighborhood is our unit of interest. All unities of what- 
ever sort are unities for a knower and answer to specific 
needs. ‘There are no unities in general, no unities divorced 
from meanings. 

We see in the creations of abstract dynamics to what 
lengths pure description can be carried. Material things 
are reduced to mass which is defined as inertia; and energy 
is evaporated into movement. It is of no importance for 
dynamics whether the object is treated as having bulk or 
as being a point of reference. “The formula is the thing; 
the reality may or mav not be present. Qualities do not 
count; only quantitative distinctions signify. [hus as 
more and more of the meaning is squeezed out of reality, 
it loses its concreteness until in the end nothing is left but 
formulae and equations. “The world of reality disappears, 
and diagrams take its place. “The diagrams are of great 
value to us because they apply to the world that we have 
excluded. 

If we accept this conclusion, we must acknowledge that 
the world of reality is throughout and altogether a human 
world. Nothing that does not bear the stamp of the 
human can exist for us. “The world is as rich and varied 
and manifold and orderly and interconnected and meaning- 
ful as we are able to make it, and no more. “This does not 
mean that the universe did not exist before we came into 
being, but that in our present apprehension of reality are 
indications which we interpret as meaning a past reaching 
back into remote periods of time. ‘The past of the world 
is a reality for us only as we can give it a meaning, that is, 
can connect it in thought with our present. 

Does, then, the meaning for a self actually inhere in the 
external thing as its essential reality? Do we not, rather, 
merely read into it our own sense of value? At first 


SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE BZ} 


thought the question can hardly be taken seriously; it 
seems to answer itself, so sure are we that the physical 
world in itself is “‘brute matter.’’ But this is because, 
whenever we raise the issue of the nature of reality, we 
ostensibly maintain the onlooker’s impersonal point of 
view, oblivious of the extent to which we read ourselves 
into the results. The last thing we think of is connecting 
ourselves with the world that lies over against us and 
appears as just that which is not ourselves. ‘The persistent 
ignoring of this connection, as we have already pointed 
out, results from the apparent independence of physical 
nature and its manifest indifference to us in its ongoings. 
The reality on which we depend and with which we must 
reckon moment by moment may indeed give rise to human 
values and have human significance; but to conclude that 
this reality has its very being in these values or in this 
human significance seems absurd. Such is the orthodox 
view of most people, and it is backed up by the tremendous 
authority of common sense. The unreflective thinker 
yielding to such a weight of evidence follows the analyst 
in stripping reality of all but its structural features, and 
concludes that he has reached the ultimate fact. 

But we must, if possible, face the problem without pre- 
judice, and give proper weight to every consideration bear- 
ing on the issue. So far as the world is known to us, not 
only the stable structure but all the changing aspects are 
the work of the mind. After all that has been said on 
the subject, this conclusion should be evident. Each situ- 
ation may appear as variously to different individuals as 
the individuals themselves differ in character and interests. 
Meanings necessarily enter into the very nature of physi- 
cal things. Without this element, this distinctively human 
reference, reality itself would disappear or cease to be for 
us. It dissolves away under the logic of the analyst. Our 
task now is to clear this conclusion of ambiguity and face 
every objection that can properly be urged against it. 

When we say that the cosmic universe is a human world 
because it is a world for human beings, what do we mean 


122 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


by the expression, a human world? ‘The entire course of 
our argument from this point on will help to elucidate 
its meaning, but just now a general statement must suffice. 
The physical world is a human world in its substantial 
character, that is, as consisting of substantial things, as 
filling objective space, and as being that to which our 
thoughts refer. “This does not say that the source of 
stimulation is human, but only that the known world is 
ours because we make it. [he substantiality of things 
consists wholly of meanings. Since meanings concern our 
practical interests and have to do with purposes, they are 
essentially human values. ‘The reality of the world as 
known and experienced, then, is value and nothing else. 
By calling things values, we accentuate the fact that 
while they may be desirable (positive values) or undesir- 
able (negative values), they cannot be indifferent. It is 
only as an object arrests attention and awakens an interest 
that it exists for us. Its complexity is the response to a 
complexity of interest. With a change of interest there 
is a corresponding change in the object. The intellectual 
structure may remain the same, just because it is not the 
concrete reality. But the reality itself is a content entirely 
dependent on the capacity and interest (broadly inter- 
preted) of the observer. It is well to note in passing that 
this distinction between intellectual structure and content, 
while convenient for exposition, is likely to be misleading. 
The two cannot be separated in the sense that a content 
can exist without a structure. ‘The structure may have a 
thought existence as a schematic representation, but the 
concrete is presupposed. It is the concrete that we take 
to be real in the objective sense. Whatever may be the 
structure of this real, it is rich in esthetic and other affec- 
tive elements. It is a nexus of values with an intellectual 
framework, which is itself a value. Take away the value 
elements, and nothing is left but the skeletonized object 
of scientific description, and that remains only by grace 
of the logical indifference which refrains from completing 
the work of value elimination. It is, as was said, because 


SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE bz 


values are so various and variable that we persist in think- 
ing of them as merely subjective. Yet as actual features 
of experience, they are as much physical properties as are 
colors, temperatures, or even the so-called primary quali- 
ties. [his statement runs counter to prejudice so deep- 
seated that the argument here sketched is not likely of 
itself to satisfy. The conclusion will, however, gain de- 
cidedly in plausibility if we (1) examine the dilemma in 
which the scientific conception of the world culminates; 
(2) study the various attempts of thinkers to escape from 
this impasse; and finally (3) note how all the attempts 
succeed only in so far as they imply or approach the 
doctrine that the reality in the external world is value- 
content. : 


CHAPTER II 
THE RESULTANT DILEMMA FOR PHILOSOPHY 


We have seen how thought by its very nature is sys- 
tematic. To think is to relate, to form concepts, laws, 
theories, formulae. When, therefore, we say that science 
is committed to a mechanical view of the world, we are 
simply recognizing the fact that science is thorough, exact 
thinking. In so far as philosophy is a thought structure, 
it too has system as its goal. Both science and philosophy 
would comprehend the world as transparent to reason. 
That none of the sciences have attained this goal even in 
their own limited field is not strange when we consider 
the tremendous complexity of their problem. But the 
reason for stopping short is strictly a practical one. “To 
carry scientific reasoning over into the last reaches of gen- 
eralization would not only be a superhuman task, but 
would probably prove of little value either in forecasting 
the future or in manipulating the present. Nevertheless 
every science is moving in the direction of the goal, and 
finds no logical necessity for stopping short of it. Such 
elementary sciences as physics and chemistry have moved 
farther toward the goal than have the biological sciences. 
While physics and chemistry meet arresting complexity 
even in their simplest units, yet by constructing mechan- 
ical models, they can exhibit this complexity as the expres- 
sion of perfect order. But the biological sciences have a 
complexity of a different character. At least it yields less 
readily to thorough analysis. “This explains why biolo- 
gists generally hesitate to accept the strict implications of 
the mechanical ideal. “They would retain at least the 
idea of physiological units or entelochies or germplasm as 


124 


RESULTANT DILEMMA FOR PHILOSOPHY 125 


successfully resisting complete systematization. But the 
existence of such entities is the subject of endless discussion 
that often degenerates into mere logomachies. The ideal 
of system is the light of all our seeing in the intellectual 
field, the guide for every advance toward a comprehension 
of our experience world. What has not yet been reduced 
to system must be looked upon as still holding problems 
for further study. 

The law-giving character of this ideal in science is 
strikingly exemplified by the attitude of scientists gen- 
erally toward the question of human freedom. ‘There 
can be no real freedom, so the argument goes, because 
every event is completely determined by the preceding 
events and in turn contributes its share in determining the 
events that follow; everything is linked up with every- 
thing else in a system. ‘There are other arguments offered 
against the doctrine of freedom, but this one lies at the 
basis of them all. While this ideal of system is a regu- 
lative principle for all thought, scientific and philosophical 
alike, it is for science the ultimate goal, whereas philosophy 
may and must transcend it. 

That science cannot go beyond it and cannot logically 
stop short of it is the conclusion that interests us now. 
It is a conclusion that could be anticipated as soon as we 
saw that science, being essentially observational, is limited 
to describing how things act. ‘This statement seems to 
place a special limitation on science; but as a matter of 
fact, the limitation pertains to all thinking. We start in 
experience with spontaneous convictions about the reality 
of the thing world, and these convictions hold to the end, 
whatever the result of critical study. But by thought 
alone we reach only relations, connections, organizing 
principles. As thought advances, these steadily encroach 
upon the realities themselves, and resolve them into a 
scheme of relations. To say that we define a thing by its 
relations is to acknowledge this fact. We here face a gen- 
uine crisis in our thought life; we are compelled, while 
not allowed, to hold that the universe is pure process. 


126 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


The compulsion is abstractly evident. But one might 
at this point protest that the argument has left the sure 
way of experience and passed into meaningless vacuity. 
The objector might say, “Science describes what it sees, 
and it never sees mere activity, but always the thing as 
active. Moreover to think at all we must have a subject 
that is distinguishable from what we think concerning it 
and this subject must have a measure of stability. The 
subject of a judgment is reality. What nonsense to main- 
tain that flying flies or flowing flows when we observe a 
bird or a stream! Science has as its task the ordering of 
our sense world and it certainly has no occasion to deny 
itself and make its task impossible by leaving the sub- 
stantial realities that are its theme and going off into pure 
vagaries about process in which nothing proceeds.”’ 

In reply we would call attention to the following items: 

(1) Science assumes reality and does not need to abjure 
it on account of analyses or the dynamic theory. Though 
the theory in the abstract may differ widely from the expe- 
rience of reality, the one may apply to the other with 
demonstrable accuracy. And this is all that science aims 
to show. However abstract and formularistic it becomes, 
science can always provide itself from experience with 
substances as subjects of its statements. But when we 
ask what these substances are, science answers that their 
inner nature is unknown, that for aught science can ascer- 
tain they are nothing more than convenient fictions. The 
whole point of the discussion, lies in the fact that science 
as such does not raise the question of reality. So long 
as it occupies itself with analysis and generalization upon 
observed phenomena, it can carry forward its work as 
far as it chooses. When the goal—the inevitable logical 
goal—is reached in thought and the world of experience 
is viewed as a never-ending flow of events, science need 
not ask what it is that flows. Its work is done, or rather 
would be if the goal could be reached in actual practice. 

(2) But suppose a person with a taste for reality 
should press the question, What flows? Suppose, then, 


RESULTANT DILEMMA FOR PHILOSOPHY 127 


that he should try to find the answer wholly within 
the domain of science, that is, to maintain the scientific 
point of view. He would be confronted with the para- 
dox of a flowing world in which nothing flows. It is 
not science that is here at fault, but a philosopher who 
would be strictly scientific. Science cannot logically 
transcend its formulae, expressive of pure process; but 
there is no need that it should. “The whole matter might 
be dropped at this point, but the scientist himself is 
always somewhat of a philosopher and therefore has an 
interest in our question. As a man he is more than a 
scientist. Our problem then confronts him. Process is 
unthinkable unless something abides of which the process 
is an expression. Cut out the permanent, as we long 
ago saw, and there can be no change; deny continuity 
of existence, and process becomes self-contradictory. This 
outcome is largely concealed from unreflective thought, 
because we so easily supply in our own experienced con- 
tinuity the one conviction that makes the external process 
possible for us. 

Our immediate problem, however, is not whether we 
ourselves are real, but whether there is any reality in the 
outside world. We may in the end have to conclude 
that these two imply each other, but this is not yet 
evident. On the one hand, we cannot think of ourselves 
as a mere part of the external flow of events without 
losing our identity and becoming as evanescent as the 
events, and thereby cancelling the possibility of a thought 
life. Nor, on the other hand, can we transfer the reality 
of the outside world to the subjective realm, for that 
would mean the reductio ad absurdum known as solipsism 
—the béte noire of philosophy. What, then, is the 
reality in the outside world, the reality that seems revealed 
in sense perception, and that so completely melts away 
under analysis into pure process? Many have been the 
answers. Those which are representative of the best 
current thought we shall need to examine somewhat care- 


128 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


fully. ‘To find the right answer is to solve at least one 
riddle of the philosophic sphinx. 


A student may draw either one of two conclusions 
from the difficulties we have been facing. He may take 
refuge in scepticism and decide that reality is unknowable 
by finite intelligence. ‘This is the easy way of escape 
from perplexities. “The sceptic holds the field so long as 
no acceptable solution is found. And he can plausibly 
contend that human knowledge is limited to concepts 
while real objects are forever distinct therefrom. Once 
started in the way of doubt, he may, with George San- 
tayana,' reason that if we would reach ultimate certainty, 
we must doubt every belief that is open to doubt, every 
belief that can be doubted without contradiction——even 
reason itself. By this procedure we seem to be liberated 
from all superstition. We can see with an open eye and 
without prejudice how all knowledge is inference and 
not reality. But thoroughgoing scepticism of this sort 
leads to intellectual paralysis. Even Santayana cannot 
maintain his position longer than to announce his con- 
clusion and then declare that it is practically absurd. 
Caught in the meshes of thorough scepticism, Santayana 
tries to justify the exercise of animal faith (‘‘animal”’ 
because pertaining to animated beings and presumably 
shared by all). Since the scepticism of Santayana and 
his followers claims to be an advanced form of realism 
(inasmuch as they recognize the reality of essence or the 
simple data of sense experience), we must leave the de- 
tailed criticism of it till we are ready to examine the 
various forms of realism and weigh their answer to our 
question. We may remark here that the way of faith is 
not philosophically satisfactory unless the faith is faith 
in reason. 


The value of scepticism lies in its demonstrating the 
failure of the philosophy that involves it. Just because 
no one can rest satisfied in general scepticism, a sceptical 


1 Scepticism and Animal Faith, chap. vi. 


RESULTANT DILEMMA FOR PHILOSOPHY 129 


conclusion becomes a powerful stimulus to further 
thinking. Only the person who gives up the search for 
ultimate insight can be content to doubt the possibility 
of truth, and such a person is almost certain to take 
refuge in some external authority, the ever ready substi- 
tute for insight. We must, then, turn away from scep- 
ticism as being essentially irrational and at best only a 
confession of failure. 

The other conclusion is the one we have repeatedly 
drawn, namely, that our difficulties arise from a defect 
of method, which philosophy must correct. Philosophy 
must insist on the insight that the external world as ex- 
perienced is necessarily related to the knowing subject 
and that this relation implies the mind’s working under 
compulsion. “The logical questions then would be, What 
does the mind contribute? and, What comes from the 
independent source of compulsion? “The way through 
the impasse of science would then become evident, and 
the sceptic would be dethroned. 

Of the positive answers to our question as to the na- 
ture of external reality, three are current that are ver- 
bally distinguishable. These are (1) the answer of the 
realist, that the reality in the external world is independ- 
ent of the knowing mind; (2) the answer of the mystic, 
that there is no reality in the external world; and (3) 
the answer of the idealistic absolutist, that reality is ex- 
perience but not the experience of any particular individ- 
ual mind. These three, especially the first and the last, 
deserve a somewhat extended examination, because they 
hold the key to most of the philosophical problems of 
the day. | 

Realism, for reasons later to be noted, breaks up into 
various schools, dogmatic or naive realism (so called by 
opponents), new realism, new rationalism, and latest of 
all, critical realism. These intermingle in a confusing 
way, in spite of their advocates’ efforts to keep them 
apart. Mysticism is more a tendency and pious convic- 
tion than a reasoned body of doctrine, though some of 


130 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


the keenest minds of all the ages have been mystics. 
Idealistic absolutism is even more various than realism. 
Idealism may pass through absolutism to positivism, 
with its negative answer to our question, or it may with 
even greater ease avoid absolutism altogether, and arrive 
at personalism. Each of these various world-views will 
contribute something to the understanding of the issue. 
But our task is far from easy. ‘The great danger is that, 
in confining our attention to the one crucial question, we 
shall not only fail to do justice to the thought systems 
as a whole, but fail as well to get the exact meaning of 
their answers to our question. Yet we must take the 
risk and avoid misrepresentations as far as possible. 


CHAPTER III 
‘THE ANSWER OF REALISM 


Realism is particularly difficult to summarize, because, 
being a comparatively recent and still developing body 
of thought, it has all the racy variety and ambiguity in- 
cident to a new movement. In general realists ally them- 
selves closely with the positive sciences, exalt analysis as 
the instrument of knowledge, and try to satisfy com- 
mon sense. ‘Their answer to our question is not un- 
equivocal, nor simple, nor easily understood. An exten- 
sive group of independent thinkers call themselves real- 
ists though they have little in common except the con- 
viction that something is radically wrong with the cur- 
rent types of idealism and that science alone can furnish 
the corrective. [hey gather recruits from every school 
of thought. In trying to understand the results of the 
many realistic attempts at the problem of reality we shall 
need to bear in mind, (1) the general character of the real- 
istic movement as a protest against the dominant forms of 
idealism, (2) the consequent heterogeneity of opinions 
that the term realism must cover, and (3) the obligation 
to secure the best possible statement of the realistic position 
as to the reality of the outside world. Our own general 
sympathy with the realistic endeavor to find “‘a new way 
of ideas’’ will insure our best endeavor to do ample justice 
while maintaining a critical attitude. No other group of 
thinkers deserve quite so full and detailed consideration, 
not only because they represent a forward-looking move- 
ment but because our particular question is central in their 
thinking. They are specialists on the subject of the real 
in nature. All healthy-minded people share with them 


131 


132 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


the conviction that the world of objects is in a sense real, 
and that any analysis of the knowing process or any theory 
of knowledge that fails to make provision for this reality 
must be summarily discarded. But we can hardly follow 
those who deride epistemology and declare themselves pre- 
Kantian dogmatists. [he term dogmatism as used, for 
instance by W. T. Marvin, a realist of the realists, means 
that the common-sense or uncritical belief in external real- 
ity is basic and criticism must conform unconditionally 
thereto. The dictum has reference to the Kantian type of 
thought, but as it is based on a misunderstanding of Kant, 
only its positive meaning concerns us. As a declaration 
of policy it looks like the extravagance of intellectual 
freakishness, a gamboling in a new found freedom. But 
criticism should not be disturbed by such pronouncements. 
Nothing in the way of knowledge can be reserved from 
criticism. The realist has his theory of knowledge, which 
he endeavors to make coherent and plausible by the same 
methods that the idealists use. 

As a protest against current idealism of the absolutist 
type—apparently the only type recognized by realists as 
significant—realism can make out a strong case. “The ab- 
solutist holds that the universe is experience, not the ex- 
perience of any one individual but just experience in gen- 
eral, somehow inclusive of all but identified with none. 
Such a notion of reality issues in the confession that it 
cannot be known. ‘The doctrine runs into ultimate ne- 
science. [his the realist cannot abide, and he is certainly 
right in rejecting it. Philosophy is an explanation of 
reality if it is anything. A doctrine of nescience is a doc- 
trine of philosophical bankruptcy. ‘The realist’s criticism 
can be supported in various ways, which we need not re- 
view. he realist further charges absolutism with being 
subjectivistic, with shutting the individual experient in 
with himself, unable to reach anything external to his own 
subjective life. If this charge holds, absolutism as a sys- 
tem of philosophy is disposed of. We find that absolut- 
ism has had serious difficulty to save itself from this criti- 


THE ANSWER OF REALISM 133 


cism. The efforts of F. H. Bradley: to protect his con- 
clusions from a solipsistic interpretation were only partly 
successful. While we are not now concerned with the at- 
tacks of realism on the inner stronghold of absolute ideal- 
ism, we can appreciate the reasons given for the revolt. 

In its more modern form realism began to be especially 
influential among English-speaking people during the lat- 
ter part of the nineteenth century, though its roots reach 
back into ancient thought. In England the movement 
was given a powerful impetus by G. E. Moore and T. 
Percy Nunn, who were followed by a group of natural 
scientists, psychologists, and philosophers, among whom 
S. Alexander, Bertrand Russell and G. Dawes Hicks are 
perhaps the most influential. “The movement found 
American thinkers ready to welcome it with more enthu- 
siasm and intellectual abandon than critical discretion. 
While the number in this country is so great that it has 
become almost a fashion to be a realist, the two groups that 
have collaborated among themselves to issue their views in 
book form may be taken as representative. The first 
group including E. B. Holt, W. T. Marvin, W. P. Mon- 
tague, R. B. Perry, W. B. Pitkin, and E. G. Spaulding 
called their book The New Realism. ‘The later group in- 
adinenlwuocake, eA.) Oc ovejoy,(.J.. By Pratt, Ay K. 
Rogers, G. Santayana, R. W. Sellars, and C. A. Strong, be- 
lieving that they could revise, strengthen, and carry for- 
ward realistic doctrine, codperated in publishing the book 
they called Essays in Critical Realism. We cannot pass 
all of these writers in review. Each states himself in a 
characteristic way and naturally refuses to be held for the 
opinions of his colleagues unless he expressly indorses 
them. The best, then, that we can hope to do is to formu- 
late, with the help of the realists themselves, the distinc- 
tively realistic answer to our question, and to appraise the 
reasons given in support of the answer. 

The realist would reverse the course of the idealistic 
argument. Whereas the idealist examines knowledge as 


1 Appearance and Reality, chap. xxi. 


134. WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


an intellectual product and concludes that reality must con- 
form to the limitations therein revealed, the realist would 
turn his attention directly to the outside world. He 
would follow the sure method of science. So long as 
people occupied themselves with logical puzzles about 
thought abstractions, the investigation of nature could 
hardly begin. If, then, a first-hand study of nature is the 
condition of scientific progress, why should not the philos- 
opher, who also wants to attain significant truth, follow 
the same method? Why should he not take the world 
just as it presents itself to him in sense perception, and find 
out by actual inspection what sort of a world it is? To 
this appeal we are inclined to yield ourselves. If the ideal- 
ist were given the opportunity here to make reply, he 
might say that what the realist proposes is not only legiti- 
mate but necessary, though the findings furnish only the 
starting point for philosophy proper. 

The realist urges further that the idealist is wrong in 
reasoning from the acknowledged assumption that to be 
known a thing must be in relation to a mind. Whereas 
the idealist concludes from this assumption that all reality 
must be mental in origin and nature, the realist asserts the 
opposite to be true, namely, that the thing must first exist 
before it can enter into relation toa mind. “The supposed 
fallacy of the idealist has been given the rather formidable 
name of “‘ego-centric predicament.’’? The conclusion of 
the realist involves the corollary that the object existing 
prior to being known enters only into external relations 
to the mind. By this is meant that the relations make no 
difference with the object itself. “Ihe distinctive doctrine, 
then, of realists as a class is that the world apprehended 
in sense perception is independent of the knower, that it 
has laws of its own, and that its being perceived does not 
in any way affect its reality. 

At this point we are embarrassed to know just what is 
meant by the term independent as applied to the real in 
experience. [he term may mean that the object is dis- 

2The New Realism, p. 11. 


THE ANSWER OF REALISM 135 


tinct as mental content from the act of knowing it, or 
that it maintains itself against any mere mental effort to 
change it, or that its past and future are beyond the in- 
dividual’s reach, or that the world as common to all tran- 
scends the individual mind, or that the world not only 
exists in its own right and with only external relations to 
the mind, but is a strictly non-mental reality. All of these 
meanings except the last even the idealist may hold, for 
they are in a sense involved in the possibility of our hav- 
ing an experience world. It would seem, then, that the 
last meaning is the one that the realist must maintain if 
he is to go beyond the idealist. “The more sturdy realists 
recognize this and make it the corner-stone of their sys- 
tem. F. J. E. Woodbridge puts the case graphically when 
he says, ‘Things sail into it (consciousness) and out again 
without any break in the continuity of their being.’’* 
That this conception is quite generally held among realists 
may be gathered from such quotations as the following. 

Alexander in his recent work, says: ‘No action of the 
mind is possible without the object and more than a plant 
can breathe without air. In sensory experience compres- 
ence with the physical revelation of a physical thing is 
brought about through the direct operation of the thing 
upon the senses. In imaging the act of mind is provoked 
from within, but in the one case as in the other the act of 
mind is face to face with its appropriate revelation.’’* 
Bertrand Russell is a little more cautious in statement; but 
he leans strongly, especially in his earlier writings, toward 
an out-and-out indorsement of the realistic view of inde- 
pendence. He holds a commanding position among Eng- 
lish philosophers of the realistic type because of his great 
learning, intellectual acumen, and assurance. In his Prob- 
lems of Philosophy, he says that we want the same object 
for different people, hence it must be public and neutral. 
A few pages later he says plainly, ‘‘In one sense, it must 

ne of Philosophy, Psychology and Scientific Method, 1910, 
Pp. ; 

4 Space, Time, and Deity, vol. i. p. 25. 


136 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


be admitted that we can never prove the existence of things 
other than ourselves and our experiences.’’> But he is 
careful to add that there is no reason to suppose that the 
whole of life is a mere dream. This admission is highly 
significant. It means that for Russell the alternatives are 
independence for the thing or the abyss of solipsism. In 
his Scientific Method in Philosophy, he says ‘It would be 
a mistake to infer that they (colors) are dependent upon 
mind, not real while we see them, or not the sole basis for 
our knowledge of the external world.’’® Later he defines 
a sensible object as being “‘just that patch of colour which 
is momentarily seen when we look at the table, or just 
that particular hardness,’’’? etc. These quotations may 
seem very non-committal. In the development of his 
argument, Russell often uses language that the most pro- 
nounced idealist could indorse, as when he defines a thing 
as a perspective (an average of all the views one may have 
of the object from varying distances). Then again his 
language is strongly realistic. The two pitfalls, solipsism 
and utter agnosticism, are ever threatening him. His rea- 
soning often inclines him to the one, his assertions save 
him from the other. When he writes within the limits 
of science he is clarity itself, though scientists may not 
agree with him. But metaphysical issues are apparently 
obtrusive annoyances to him. Well may they be, for in 
metaphysics he must face dilemmas whichever way he 
turns. Ina more recent work, as well as in certain maga- 
zine articles, he seems even less sure of himself. He doubts 
if he should longer call himself a realist, though he still 
confesses sympathy with many of the realistic positions. 
It is with reference to the existence of an independent real 
that he has become sceptical. ‘‘Belief in the existence of 
things outside my own biography,” he declares, “ 

must be regarded as a prejudice, not as a well Hottie 

BP 34, 


Meat Osts 
Rs Os 


THE ANSWER OF REALISM Ay, 


theory. . . . . I propose to continue yielding to the 
prejudice.””® This conclusion that belief in reality is a 
prejudice results from his inability to bridge the chasm 
between an image in the mind and such a hypothetical 
reality. He also finds insuperable difficulty in accounting 
for objects remembered and anticipated. 

G. E. Moore, who brought the realistic movement into 
prominence by his famous article® published in Mind, is 
quite technical and cautious in his treatment of the ques- 
tion. In the course of a discussion before the Aristotelian 
Society he asks, ‘““Do sensibles (the sort of entities experi- 
enced in sensory experience) ever exist at times when they 
are not being experienced at all?’’*® His answer though 
halting, is affirmative. Hesays, “*. .. . there is nothing 
to prevent us from holding that... . all sorts of un- 
experienced sensibles do exist.’ Then the questior 
arises whether sensibles and physical objects are the 
same. ‘This he answers tentatively in the negative. ‘The 
natural view to take as to the status of sensibles gener- 
ally, relatively to physical objects, would be that none of 
them; whether experienced or not, were ever in the same 
place as any physical object. “That none, therefore, exist 
‘anywhere’ in physical space; while, at the same time, 
Welcan also Say...) ... that none’ exist) in the ‘mind,’ 
except in the sense that some are directly apprehended by 
some minds. . . . Some, and some only, resemble the 
physical objects which are their source in respect of their 
Babeincom Sato physical ‘objectsi/ he sayss {i.e e) bike to 
say of a physical object that it existed at a given time will 
always consist merely in saying of some sensible, not 
that it existed at the time in question, but something quite 
different and immensely complicated.’’4* These passages 
apparently commit Moore to the following statements: 


8 The Analysis of Mind, p. 132 f. 

9‘The Refutation of Idealism,’’ Mind, 1903, pp. 433-453. 
10 Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 1913-14, p. 366. 
11P, 379. 

12 P, 379 f. 

nA Se fe J 


138 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


(1) Sense perception involves some form of mental ac- 
tivity. (2) The sensibles are mental content in so far 
as they constitute the qualities of the apprehended object, 
but they may exist wholly apart from and antecedent to 
experience. (3) The sensibles are therefore not neces- 
sarily mental, they are not physical and do not exist in 
physical space. (4) Hence the sensibles have an unde- 
fined sort of existence or reality intermediate between the 
physical object and the mental content. “Though many 
questions suggest themselves at this point, we may reason- 
ably conclude that Moore indorses the realistic doctrine 
of independence. [he physical for him is the source of 
compulsion in sense perception. 

Among American realists we find less hesitancy, espe- 
cially within the group of those who call themselves New 
Realists. Ralph Barton Perry defines the doctrine of in- 
dependence as meaning for him “‘that things may be, and 
are, directly experienced without owing either their being 
or their nature to that circumstance.’’* E. G. Spaulding 
is equally explicit. He says, ““The knowing process nei- 
ther causally affects, modifies, or creates that which is 
known, nor demands an underlying entity to mediate the 
relationship between knowledge and its object.’’® 

The ambiguity mentioned as lurking in the realistic 
doctrine of independence is now evident. The physical 
object seems to be a nondescript, neither mental content 
nor strictly non-mental in character, but somehow par- 
taking of both or connected with both while independent. 
When the reality of the physical object is in question, its 
independence is asserted with emphasis, yet there is always 
a doubt whether the asseveration is to be interpreted as 
meaning a total disparateness from mental content or as 
accentuating the difference between the object as appre- 
hended at the moment and the object in its determinate 
cosmic context. Most if not all of the realists recognize 
that in order to explain the possibility of a knowledge of 


14 Present Philosophical Tendencies, p. 315. 
15 The New Rationalism, p. 11 


THE ANSWER OF REALISM 139 


an independent thing, a tertium quid must mediate be- 
tween the thing and the mind. One way of meeting this 
requirement is to assume a preéstablished harmony. This 
harmony guarantees the accuracy of the mental represen- 
tative. The two entities harmonized in this way need 
not be alike in qualities or appearance, but only alike in 
varying together according to ascertainable laws. But un- 
less the theory can guarantee all mental content, some way 
must be found to differentiate illusory content from mat- 
ter of fact. 

This problem of illusion and error is acknowledged to 
be troublesome to realists, but so is it to thinkers of every 
school. It is a kind of touchstone by which to test the 
adequacy of theories of knowledge. Some realists con- 
tend that the mental content in illusions and dreams rep- 
resents actual physical objects, but that some confusion 
has been introduced on the mental side. ‘This is curious. 
It suggests the question whether all the qualities appre- 
hended in the mental content or only some of them are 
represented in the physical thing. On this subject realists 
are divided. ‘I. Percy Nunn is persuaded that the physical 
object, considered as strictly physical (does he mean non- 
mental?), has all the qualities attributed to it and perhaps 
a great many more not represented in the mental series.1° 
He even declares that the stick which appears as a straight 
stick in the air and as a bent stick when partially sub- 
merged is really two sticks, and both are real. “This view 
seems to be held also by Alexander.'7 We are not now 
criticizing the theory but trying to understand it and its 
manifest implications. [hat these implications are em- 
barrassing is evident; for if the mental content simply re- 
produces the qualities of the physical object in so far as 
the content is definite, then there must be as many objects 
as apprehensions of it. In other words, the physical object 
tends to vanish entirely as an independent entity, and to 

16 Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 1909-10, pp. 191-231, 


and 1915-16, pp. 156-178. 
1? Mind, 1912, p. 3. 


140 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


give way to the mental content as the only reality. Thus 
the specter of solipsism becomes portentous. 

It may seem too much to say that realists who appeal 
to preéstablished harmony have no recourse but to accept 
the consequence that illusions and dream objects are objec- 
tively real. Are illusions real? Do dream objects have a 
local habitation in the physical world? Bertrand Russell 
approaches an affirmative answer when he says that “‘there 
are no such things as ‘illusions of sense.’ Objects of sense, 
even when they occur in dreams, are the most indubitably 
real objects known to us.’’1® But we must not too has- 
tily conclude that Russell means what he seems to say. 
As has been noticed in other connections, he is here also 
ambiguous. He is not speaking of objects in the ordinary 
sense, but patches of color and other qualities of things. 
By identifying sensations of quality with the quality it- 
self he completes the confusion. “This confusion enables 
him to say: ‘The sensation that we have when we see 
a patch of colour simply is that patch of colour, an actual 
constituent of the physical world. . ... The patch of 
colour may be both physical and psychical.’’*® The 
strange vacillation of Russell in dealing with the problem 
of reality and illusion is largely accounted for by his spe- 
cial type of psychology. In his Analysis of Mind, he 
holds that the entire content of the mental life consists of 
sensations and images.?° “The sensations are given or pro- 
duced in the nervous system by external stimuli, while 
images are of the same character but produced from 
within.” Knowledge does not arise till we believe some- 
thing in connection with sensations and images, and be- 
lief is a feeling.** Sensations, images, and feelings are his 
stock in trade by which to explain the complicated men- 
tal processes, volition, appreciation, the knowledge of the 


18 Scientific Method in Philosophy, p. 85. 
19 The Analysis of Mind, p. 142 f. 

20 Cf. p. 143. 

21 Cf, p. 150. 

BP GE D233. 


THE ANSWER OF REALISM 14] 


external world, and all the varied purposive activities. No 
wonder that this equipment should prove inadequate 
when he would tell us what the truth is about the external 
world. He shifts from realism to idealism and then to 
scepticism or phenomenalism. Elsewhere he suggests 
that a piece of matter is not a single substance manifesting 
different appearances to different observers, but is merely a 
system of connected occurrences including all those which 
older views would regard as appearances of the piece of 
matter in question.?* ‘This is as idealistic as any statement 
one could easily find in philosophical literature. From 
the viewpoint of our present inquiry Russell’s devious 
course is the more interesting because he tries to be just to 
all the factors of knowledge and still remain within the 
limitations of the scientific observer. He solves no philo- 
sophical problem, and he fails most conspicuously in his 
attempt to explain illusion and error. 

What is the status of remembered objects? Do they 
too exist in the independent realm along with illusions 
and dream objects? Are they present or absent when 
remembered? ‘The question could be answered in the 
usual common-sense way but for the necessity on realistic 
principles of having the object actually present when the 
mental content of experience refers to it. “[he sense data 
of which the experience consists are given by the object. 
If no object, then no sense data, no sensations, no images, 
unless perchance the images are somehow preserved across 
the intervening time and on occasion pass from the dor- 
mant to the active state. But even so, the image is not a 
new sense experience but a remembered past experience. 
Alexander meets the issue by saying, ‘The pastness of the 
object is a datum of experience, directly apprehended. The 
object is compresent with me as past.’’** On the follow- 
ing page, speaking of an individual he remarks, ‘The per- 
cept of him and the memory of him are two different ap- 
pearances which in their connection reveal the one thing, 


23 Nation and Atheneum, Jan. 6, 1923. 
24 Space, Time, and Deity, vol. i. p. 113. 


142 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


the man, whom we know to-day by perceiving and to have 
been yesterday by remembering. Moreover the memory is 
as much a physical object as the percept.’’ In the same 
manner he explains the images of anticipated objects. 
They are real objects. “Expectation is precisely like re- 
membering except that the object has the mark of future, 
that is of later than our present, instead of past or ear- 
liers; 48 

This theory of the compresence of remembered object 
and mental content in remembering seems bizarre. Yet 
it appears to be a legitimate deduction from a realism that 
starts with the doctrine of independence, discounts the 
constructive mental work in sense perception, relies on the 
nervous system to hold the sense data for later exploita- 
tion, and in consequence makes the presence of the physical 
object necessary to experiencing it. “The object is com- 
present whether we apprehend it directly as present or 
indirectly as past. “The deduction seems legitimate, but 
the hiatus between the present though independent object 
and the mental content is not yet bridged. 

Russell treats the question of memory with as little 
illumination as Alexander. He confesses, “‘If we had re- 
tained the ‘subject’ or ‘act’ in knowledge, the whole prob- 
lem of memory would have been comparatively simple. 
We could then have said . . . . the act of remembering 
is present, though its object is past.’’*® But his objective 
point of view in studying mental phenomena precludes 
his recognizing the mind as other than a series of sense 
data and images, and these cannot act. “They are orphans 
in the mental world with no one to claim them and no 
power in themselves. The best, then, that Russell can 
say of memory seems to be contained in the statement, 
‘“‘Memory-images and imagination-images do not differ 
in their intrinsic qualities, so far as we can discover. They 
differ by the fact that the images that constitute memories, 
unlike those that constitute imagination, are accompanied 


25 [bid., p. 115. 
26 The Analysis of Mind, p. 163. 


THE ANSWER OF REALISM 143 


by a feeling of belief which may be expressed in the words 
‘this happened.’ ’’?7 This statement is not explanation, it 
is not even an attempt to meet the real difficulty; it is a 
plain case of ignoring, and does not merit further discus- 
sion. 

The new realists and their near of kin who hold to the 
doctrine of the independent object have not been able to 
meet the difficulties of their position. But may not the 
so-called critical realists whose realism is not so pro- 
nounced be able to give a better account of the real in ex- 
perience? ‘The characteristic doctrine of the critical real- 
ists is that the real is essence; all else is inference, more or 
less reliable. Suggestions of this doctrine are found all 
through the literature of the new realists. Moore's dis- 
tinction between sensibles and the physical object, Perry’s 
contention that colors are neither physical nor psychi- 
cal,2* and Marvin’s conception of structure or relations 
as alone real,?® point to the doctrine. Spaulding, in The 
New Rationalism,*® revives the ancient doctrine that uni- 
versals as subsistences are real though they do not exist. 
These subsistences—such as ‘‘justice,’’ “‘ideals,’’ ‘“‘num- 
ber,’ and “‘ideal systems of mechanics’’—are the perma- 
nent realities, while objects change. 

The critical realist valiantly and hopefully attacks the 
central problem of independence again from what he con- 
siders an entirely different point of view. He holds that 
the new realists fail because they accept the theory that 
physical objects, though entirely distinct, are somehow 
reproduced or represented in the mental content; that is, 
the sense data as media correctly represent the physical 
object from which they originate. This conception of 
the relation between the object and mental content seems 
to the critical realist to involve the conclusion—to use 
Pratt’s illustration—that a remembered friend, long since 


27 Ibid., p. 176. 

28 Present Philosophical Tendencies, p. 310. 

29 The History of European Philosophy, p. 415 ff. 
Me Seo eae, LO 


144 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


passed away, is actually present in the memory, though 
known not to be present.*t his absurdity is avoided, 
according to the critical realist, by giving up the “‘copy”’ 
theory, and adopting the view that the given is the “‘es- 
sence’ of the thing, whose existence is not given but ac- 
cepted as a reasonable conviction. ‘By ‘essence,’’’ says 
Strong, “I mean its (the thing’s) what divorced from its 
that—its entire concrete nature, including its sensible 
character, but not its existence.’’°* [his passage should 
be interpreted in the light of what Sellars states more ex- 
plicitly. He says, “What, then, is knowledge? It is the 
recognized possession by the mind of the ‘form’ of the 
thing, that is, its position, size, structure, causal capacities, 
etc. It is the mediated grasp of those features of the thing 
which are reproducible.’’*? Again he says, ‘‘Physical 
things are the objects of knowledge, though they can be 
known only in terms of the data which they control 
within us.’’** Objects control the data, and the data vary 
with the conditions, such as distance and position.*® 
Evidently the realism that calls itself critical is moving 
away from the new realism toward its opposite. The 
thing, though acknowledged to be independent, is no 
longer known directly by its floating or sailing into con- 
sciousness, but only indirectly as mediated by a causal re- 
lation. ‘The effect on the mind may or may not be like 
the causal element in the thing. Critical realists are not 
ready to commit themselves on this point; they have no 
way of determining the question of likeness or unlikeness. 
In this connection the words of Pratt are significant. He 
says: ‘‘Critical realism does not pretend to be meta- 
physics. It is perfectly possible for the critical realist to 
be a panpsychist, a metaphysical dualist, a Platonist, or 
an ontological idealist of some other type. Only so much 


81 Critical Realism, p. 97. 

82 Ibid., p. 223. 

88 Jbid., p. 218. 

84 Ibid., p. 217. 

85 Cf. tbid., pp. 200, 203, 210. 


THE ANSWER OF REALISM 145 


of the metaphysical problem need critical realists be agreed 
upon as is required by the epistemological doctrine which 
they holdin common. ‘They believe, namely, that ‘physi- 
cal’ things exist independently of being known; that they 
may be our objects, but that they are never our mental 
content; that they differ in some respects from the quality- 
groups of our perception (e.g. in not possessing the sec- 
ondary qualities which we find in our percepts); but that 
they stand in such causal relation to our percepts that it 
is possible for science to investigate some of these relations 
and some of the relations between the physical things, and 
thus to gain trustworthy knowledge concerning the laws 
of their actions. As to any exhaustive knowledge of the 
inner and ultimate nature of these non-human entities, 
critical realism is willing to admit itself ignorant, and, in 
fact, hands over the question to the scientists and the 
metaphysicians.’’?° 

The metaphysics in this passage is of special interest to 
us. It includes the assertion that the existent thing and 
the mental content are not only distinct but are not alike, 
and that their relation to each other is causal. This is 
good as far as it goes. But what is the existent? Is it 
the physical object? Has it any of the properties of the 
physical object? Or is it what we have designated simply 
as the source of stimulation? Apparently the critical real- 
ists balk at this point and insist that we cannot know the 
causal reality, because, whether physical or not, it is not 
mental content. “The student need not be surprised, there- 
fore, to see the further development of realism toward an 
almost complete scepticism. 

As already noted, this development was heralded by 
George Santayana in his book, Scepticism and Animal 
Faith. With considerable skill and literary finish, he sets 
forth his reasons for theoretical doubt of everything that 
makes life livable. He easily disposes of religious beliefs, 
then history and literature, then the natural sciences, then 
the self as a moral personality, then the past as a whole 

36 Ibid., p. 109. 


146 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


including consciousness and change. A quotation or two 
will be interesting in this connection, “‘Belief in the exist- 
ence of anything, including myself, is something radically 
incapable of proof, and resting, like all belief, on some ir- 
rational persuasion or prompting of life. .... The 
point is, in this task of criticism, to discard every belief 
that is a belief merely; and the belief in existence, in the 
nature of the case, can be a belief only.’’*7 ‘“‘My thesis 
(is) that nothing given exists.’"** Arguments many and 
authorities not a few among the ‘‘deep-voiced philoso- 
phers’’ both Oriental and Western are given as supporting 
this conclusion. But the author seems to be merely ex- 
hibiting the keen edge of his intellectual tools and demon- 
strating their cutting power. His all-embracing scepticism 
is preparing the way for the coming of his doctrine of 
essence. ‘Ihe essence is for Santayana a great discovery. 
He announces it somewhat dramatically. ‘“‘The unintel- 
ligible accident of existence will cease to appear to lurk in 
this manifest being, weighting and crowding it, and 
threatening it with being swallowed up by nondescript 
neighbours. It will appear dwelling in its own world, 
and shining by its own light, however brief may be my 
glimpse of it; for no date will be written on it, no frame 
of full or of empty time will shut it in; nothing in it will 
be addressed to me, nor suggestive of any spectator. It 
will seem an event in no world, an accident in no experi- 
ence. The quality of it will have ceased to exist; it will 
be merely the quality which it inherently, logically, and 
inalienably is. It will be an ESSENCE.’’*® 

What after all is this essence? We are not permitted 
to think of it as in any sense a logical product like a uni- 
versal; its naked simplicity is beyond reason. Nor may 
we identify it with an event in time and hence it cannot 
be any part of our experience. Nor finally can it be 
known as a thing-in-itself independent of experience, for 


87 Scepticism and Animal Faith, p. 35. 
38 Tbid., p. 52. 
39 [bid., p.73 f. 


THE ANSWER OF REALISM 147, 


then it would be an inference that is not an inference. It 
is certainly a nondescript that Santayana can use only after 
he has by an exercise of ‘‘animal faith,’’ reclothed it and 
given it a determinate place in experience. “The whole 
transaction suggests opéra bouffe.*? But there is more in 
it than that. We cannot understand realism and its off- 
spring, scepticism, till we have penetrated to their inner 
motifs and appraised their underlying assumptions. 

The three main objectives of realism have been to win 
for philosophy the prestige of the natural sciences, to sat- 
isfy common sense in its most acceptable and enlightened 
expression, and to discover a common basis of agreement 
among philosophical students. The first objective has 
failed of realization, because science ends in formulae, 
while realism is for science a leap in the dark into the un- 
explorable regions of metaphysical entities. “The second 
objective is quickly satisfied, but only until common 
sense becomes a little more critical. The third objective 
can never be reached so long as uncertainty remains as to 
what shall be the starting point. Realism undertook to 
lay down principles or postulates that would be beyond 
criticism, but found it necessary to modify them under 
stress of critical attacks till the postulates had to be sur- 
rendered as hostages to scepticism. The realistic objec- 
tives have determined the method of procedure and 
account for the persistent limitations of insight. In par- 
ticular the realists have had to depend on analysis to fur- 
nish ultimate data. [hey assumed that by analysis of 
physical complexes, ultimate simples could be reached and 
these would be the reals.*4 But as we have found, analy- 
sis is always accompanied by a process of synthesis and 
hence can never bring thought face to face with an abso- 
lute simple. Then the objective point of view has forced 
the realist into the camp of the behaviorists, where he 
must resolve mental phenomena into activities of the 


40 For a trenchant criticism of Santayana, cf. George Boas, Journal 
of Philosophy, 1925, p. 645 ff. 


41 The New Realism, p. 24, cf. pp. 155-247. 


148 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


nervous system, plus sense data given or produced by an 
independent physical object. “Thus the realistic answer to 
our question becomes a logical tangle. “The physical ob- 
ject is independent of being perceived, yet is the cause of 
our perceiving it, yet does not actually produce the mental 
content, yet is manifested in the form of mental content, 
yet is not always what it seems to be in perception, yet 
when correctly perceived has at least the primary qualities 
of the perceived object, yet as non-mental cannot be like 
the mental content in any particular, yet must somehow 
function in sense perception. Since its existence cannot 
be doubted, belief in its existence is a prejudice, not a rea- 
soned inference. 

It was this confusion that influenced the critical realist 
to offer his “‘essence’’ as affording a way out. ‘The essence, 
not being an existence in space and time and not being a 
substance, escapes from one set of difficulties. Not being 
psychical content in the particularistic sense, essence can- 
not be held to involve solipsism and the absurdities that 
center in that conception. But it is independent only asa 
meaning is independent of the object to which it refers; 
it is non-mental only as other than the individual mental 
content present in a particular sense perception. ‘The 
“essence’’ persists in blending with the individual object 
of perception as soon as it functions at all. Nevertheless 
it refuses to coalesce with the physical object, inasmuch as 
the object is definite and particular, never a mere universal. 
The way of advance for critical realism seems to be either 
to forswear metaphysics—though realism is a metaphysi- 
cal theory—or to pass into theoretical scepticism, prepara- 
tory to a further advance into some form of idealism. 

Before parting with realism, let us try briefly to recast 
its conclusions in the light of the criticism offered. We 
can start with the unqualified acceptance of the realistic 
doctrine of independence, but the independent entity is not 
some mystical, unreachable thing in the physical world 
which though never seen is yet somehow known to be 
there. It is the cause or source of the stimulations that 


THE ANSWER OF REALISM 149 


control the mind in sense perception. The relation be- 
tween the source of stimulations and the physical object 
in the world of effects is such that for all practical pur- 
poses the object may be treated as if it were itself the 
source of its being known—causally active in producing 
itself. The physical object can always be distinguished 
from the perceived object as being more definite, complex, 
and permanent, but this is not to be construed as meaning 
that the physical object is non-mental in origin; it is 
simply the ideal of an object that satisfies other than the 
immediate interests. [he physical object as apprehended 
is real, but only as effect, never as cause. “Thus every diffi- 
culty inherent in realism is obviated. The lesson of real- 
ism for us is the necessity of affirming an independent en- 
tity, and the impossibility of identifying that entity with 
the physical object. 

As mysticism does not profess to be primarily a theory 
of the real in the external world, but refers to it only in- 
cidentally, we can profitably postpone a notice of this 
type of thought until the absolutistic views are considered. 
It will then appear closely affiliated with idealism. We 
are now ready to ask our question of the idealist. 


CHAPTER IV 
THE ANSWER OF RECENT IDEALISM 


Realism has shown in a concrete way the limitations of 
the scientific approach to the problem of external reality. 
It has illustrated the confusions that result when the real 
is identified either with the cosmic object or with the sense 
object of immediate perception. It makes a desperate ven- 
ture when it takes refuge in the idea of essence as a tertium 
guid, for essence is neither physical nor mental, neither 
substance nor cause, and not even an event except for the 
mind that thinks it. This doctrine of essence looks very 
much like an extreme form of idealism or rationalism or, 
better, scepticism in masquerade. As we turn to idealism 
for its answer to our question, we may expect to escape 
many of the difficulties that beset realism, but are not so 
confident that we may not encounter others equally serious. 

Idealists as a class have in modern times been primarily 
philosophers, that is, they have busied themselves with the 
problem of reality and the epistemological issues involved. 
rather than with the objectives and methods of scientific 
investigation. Instead of falling back on common sense 
and locating the independently real in the outside world, 
the idealists have been much more thoroughgoing in their 
efforts to find a critically satisfactory theory. ‘This is the 
main distinction between realists and idealists. But the 
two schools shade off into each other. In fact, most ideal- 
ists of the present day, except the absolutists, incline to 
reckon themselves realists, since they too believe in an in- 
dependent real. On the other hand, every philosopher, 
from the ultra-realist of the IT. Percy Nunn type to the 
mystic absolutist, is idealistic in some feature of his think- 


150 


THE ANSWER OF RECENT IDEALISM Mee 


ing. Moreover idealism has been in vogue so long that 
practically every possible variation and every degree of 
saturation have been tried. For this reason the distinction 
between realist and idealist when not carefully qualified 
is of little value in characterizing an individual thinker. 
To get the contrast that may serve our purpose, we must 
deal with extreme types—the realists who argue for the 
strict independence of the objective world and the idealists 
who would reduce the world to a form of experience. 
The most consistent and thorough are likely to give the 
most nearly final answer possible to their type of thought. 

Idealism began with the belief that thought could find 
itself in its object. It built on the insight that truth al- 
ways takes the form of a concept or law and is never a 
mere sense datum. ‘The two characteristics of a concept, 
that of having a fixed content and that of representing 
various and changing objects, constitute its truth. When 
Socrates isolated these elements of truth he set the task for 
science. As conceptual content is the material of all 
knowledge, the substance even of our sense world, we nat- 
urally treat it as the basic reality from which all else is 
derived. It is thus that we reach the notion of essence or 
raw material of specific existences. Apparently the only 
alternative to this conception of reality is the view that 
finds the reality in the continuous succession of sense im- 
pressions. If we take the first alternative and hold that 
reality is the abiding conceptual content, we can build an 
imposing structure of intellectual elements. Every item 
of experience can have its definite place and function in the 
ordered whole, and the universe can be set forth in out- 
line as an infinitely complex network of interrelated ele- 
ments. As system, then, the universe would include all 
existences, all realities, hence might properly be called the 
absolute. Having reached the idea of the absolute as the 
all-inclusive, we can easily take the next step and conclude 
that the absolute is self-existent, a unitary whole, change- 
less yet including change, timeless yet encompassing an in- 
finite number of temporal series. 


152 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


If we take the other alternative and locate the real in 
the changing flux, we find, as we have seen, great embar- 
rassment in trying to tell what the flux actually is. It 
never is, but is always becoming, always vanishing at the 
moment of appearing. So far from being self-sustaining, 
it must be from moment to moment continuously renewed. 
If, however, the real is pure process, there is nothing from 
which or by which to renew it. If something is assumed 
that persists and expresses itself in the process, then this 
persisting thing rather than the flow of events must be the 
reality. [hus the two possibilities that seem at first so 
disparate and even mutually exclusive, are found to imply 
each other. Idealism has wrestled with this problem and 
tried to do justice to both factors; with what success we 
shall presently see. 

In the modern development of idealism two main cur- 
rents are distinguishable, both going back to Kant and 
Hegel for immediate inspiration and guidance. One 
shows a strong bent toward the objective treatment of all 
issues. In the thought of those who belong to this move- 
ment, the ideal of system is all-determining. Consilience 
and comprehensiveness are the tests of truth. “The whole 
must be internally consistent and must comprehend abso- 
lutely all. “he connections within the system are assumed 
to be so close that nothing can be fully known till its rela- 
tions to all else in the universe are understood—an ob- 
viously impossible requirement. The conclusion follows 
that we can know nothing as we should, that all knowl- 
edge distorts reality to some extent and never does it full 
justice. “This mild form of theoretical scepticism soon 
becomes pernicious, infectious, and fatal. The other de- 
velopment of idealism started with the Hegelian conclu- 
sion that the completely adequate principle of explanation 
(‘‘Idea’’ in Hegel’s terminology) cannot be a concept, 
since all concepts refer to other concepts for their full 
meaning. ‘The ultimate principle must furnish “‘its own 
other.”’ By this rather cryptic expression Hegel meant 
that the reality which would explain the world must in- 


THE ANSWER OF RECENT IDEALISM 153 


clude the world as its own object, and hence could not be 
merely an intellectual content. Only the self as having 
experiences and sustaining various active relations to its 
experiences can fulfil these requirements. The develop- 
ment of this line of thought has yielded the body of doc- 
trine that seems to us to express the utmost limit of pres- 
ent-day insight into the mysteries of existence. 

The interpretation of Hegel’s doctrine as the apotheo- 
sis of system has been very generally accepted. It seems 
to be involved in his premises, even if it is not what he 
himself held to be true. Hence we have now to consider 
this interpretation as marking the main current of recent 
idealism. By common consent the best representatives of 
this movement are F. H. Bradley and his school (includ- 
ing Bernard Bosanquet, A. E, Taylor, and Josiah Royce, 
not to mention the younger adherents). 

In his great work entitled Appearance and Reality, 
Bradley subjects realistic metaphysics to a searching criti- 
cism. He finds contradictions in every part of experience 
when the objective world is taken to be other than idea- 
tional content. He emphasizes the somewhat ambiguous 
view that reality is always the theme or subject of predi- 
cation, yet holds that whatever we may say concerning it 
is ideal psychic stuff and not reality. “Thus the ‘“‘what’’ 
becomes severed from the ‘‘that’’ and thereby declares it- 
self mere appearance. ‘The inevitable conclusion would 
seem to be that we can know nothing of reality, not even 
that it exists. 

Whenever a thinker attacks the competency of human 
intelligence to discover truth, he handicaps all further pro- 
gress by discrediting his only instrument. But Bradley 
recovers in part by distinguishing between absolute or 
theoretically complete knowledge and relative or practi- 
cally useful knowledge. The latter is of course within 
our limited powers. In the first book of his volume he 
exposes the lurking contradictions in what is usually taken 
for knowledge, in order that he may prepare the way for 
the positive conclusions in the second book. He does his 


154 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


first work so thoroughly that the reader who accepts 
wholeheartedly his negative conclusions finds great difh- 
culty in following him in his positive constructions. 

Bradley’s dialectical work was made all too easy by the 
use of tests that apply only under restricted conditions. 
We shall need to examine these tests and their use if we 
would appreciate his contribution to the problem we are 
considering. Since he is attacking realism, he tests ordi- 
nary conceptions of reality as if they implied the doc- 
trine of independence. Contradictions of course multiply 
when you treat the sense world as other than the sense 
world. ‘To make that world independent while a pro- 
duct of thinking is to be guilty of a fundamental absurd- 
ity. This thesis is proved by Bradley with great acumen 
and fullness of detail. ‘To illustrate his method we may 
take his discussion of substance and attribute (“‘substan- 
tive’ and “‘adjective’’ in his terminology).! He finds it 
easy to point out contradictions between the two ideas. 
Substance is nothing without the attributes, yet to iden- 
tify them is to cancel each. A thing has qualities, but is 
not any one of them. ‘Thus a piece of sugar is not sweet- 
ness, nor whiteness, nor squareness, nor all of these char- 
acteristics, considered severally. It is a unity, and there- 
fore distinct from its qualities. But then it must estab- 
lish relations among its qualities. “he puzzles increase as 
we try to make out what these relations can be. Are 
they independent things? ‘hen they create the problem 
of relation over again. Are they mere attributes of quali- 
ties? Then they fail to relate; the qualities fall apart. 
Are the qualities nothing but relations? ‘Then the thing 
itself disappears; it commits “‘a kind of suicide.’’ ‘‘The 
thing with its adjectives,’’ Bradley concludes, ‘‘is a device 
for enjoying at once both variety and concord. But the 
distinctions, once made, fall apart from the thing, and 
away from one another.” 

The contradictions here disclosed hold for the experi- 
enced thing taken as non-mental reality, but certainly do 
not hold for experience as such. ‘The substance or thing 


1 Appearance and Reality, chap. ii. 


THE ANSWER OF RECENT IDEALISM |e) 


is real in its own way, and the qualities are real in their 
way. Neither is the other, and both are found as aspects 
of the sense world. The contradictions are avoided by 
thinking of substance or thinghood as pertaining to the 
relatively permanent character of the empirical law by 
which the given successive experiences are thought as 
changes in the states of a thing. “The qualities are quali- 
ties of the thing, yet not the thing; because when we 
think the qualities we are concerned with the various mani- 
festations in the experience. From the diverse angles of 
interest we have distinguishable features. “The relations 
are not to be thought as disparate from the thing or its 
parts, but are the way the mind holds the elements to- 
gether while distinguishing them. This too is legitimate 
and involves no contradiction. But contradictions abound 
when these various aspects are thrust into a world of 
things-by-themselves. Bradley has proved not that ele- 
mentary experience is full of contradictions, but that con- 
tradictions develop as soon as we take it for anything 
other than experience. 

By assuming as a conclusion from his dialectic that con- 
tradictions inhere in experience as such, Bradley has made 
very difficult his further task of formulating his own doc- 
trine of reality. To give reality a positive content and 
avoid the besetting contradictions is the problem. He is 
sure that the absolutely real is both substantial and uni- 
tary, though not in a sense comprehensible by us. ‘There 
cannot possibly be a plurality of reals,? for that would in- 
volve a contradiction nullifying the possibility of system. 
Whatever the absolute is it must be system, though of 
course not like the thought systems we are able to con- 
struct. Our thought systems include distinctions and 
relations, and these cannot without contradiction be car- 
ried over into the absolute. “They would disrupt its 
unity. Having discounted thought as an instrument of 
knowledge, Bradley must deny to the absolute reality all 
characteristics of thought as we understand it. The 


2 Ibid., pp. 140, 468 f. 


156 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


nearest he can come to indicating what the absolute reality 
is in its inner nature is to call it experience.* But whose 
experience can it be? Not yours, nor mine, nor any- 
body’s in particular; nor is it any thought structure built 
out of human experiences, but it is simply experience in 
general. It is nobody’s and it is absolute. Although it 
cannot be identified with any individual’s experience and 
is not a mere blending of them all, yet everything that 
happens to any individual makes a difference with it and 
is “‘somehow’’ (this is a favorite word) taken up into it. 
Nothing is lost, though all is changed into something 
else. Our thoughts about the world—so Bradley finally 
concludes, though without logical warrant—approximate 
the absolute reality in varying degrees as measured by 
their comprehensiveness and coherence.t This is his 
famous doctrine of degrees of truth and reality. 

It begins to look as if we should get very little help 
from this type of thought except in a negative way. he 
sense world is resolved into “‘mere’’ appearance in contrast 
with the absolute (the reality), yet the absolute is noth- 
ing Over against its appearances. It can tolerate none of 
the qualitative distinctions in our experience, yet can dis- 
pense with none of them. It is infinitely rich, yet we are 
forbidden to say anything about it, lest we say that it 
is something when in fact it is something else. This 
heaping up of paradoxes is confusing. It is difficult to 
see how Bradley can escape utter scepticism. 

The doctrine of degrees of truth and reality, which is 
an attempt to avoid the implied negative conclusions, 
succeeds to some extent, but only in so far as it destroys 
the grounds on which the conclusions were based. It 
implies, for instance, the validity of thought laws. Start- 
ing from this point, we might reconstruct the whole sys- 
tem and reach quite different conclusions. Why then 
does Bradley become so hopelessly involved? Why does 
his masterly criticism of realistic theories land him in 


8 Ibid., pp. 144, 173. 
4Ibid., pp. 395-400. 


THE ANSWER OF RECENT IDEALISM 157 


such a snarl of contradictions? An answer to this ques- 
tion would have to take into account, among other con- 
siderations, two of prime importance. 

(1) As just intimated, he has to rely on thought tests 
to prove that thought is mendacious. The test of non- 
contradiction, in the first book, resolves everything into 
‘contradictory’ appearance. In order to rescue some- 
thing that he may call real, he has in the second book 
to modify this test and make it twofold. It now sepa- 
rates into the two principles of coherence and compre- 
hensiveness. “[hese presuppose not only the logical struc- 
ture of a thought system but a universe of concrete ma- 
terial to be covered by it. If then—we have a right to 
conclude—an all-encompassing system could be thought 
through even in barest outline, it would be wholly true 
in every respect, though not the whole truth. It would 
be reality in structure. ‘The task then would be to fill 
in the details as far as possible. Even when the elabora- 
tion was carried as far as human patience and industry 
were able, the system would still be far from complete, 
but it would be reality up to its measure. Such is the 
plausible way of reasoning from the principle of com- 
prehensiveness. But this principle could be applied only 
after all the practical tests had been satisfied. ‘To attain 
ultimate accuracy as measured by these tests would be 
the main difficulty. 

(2) In maintaining that there is but one reality and 
that all else is mere appearance, Bradley must deny the 
reality of the finite self. This leads to all his crisscross 
conclusions. At the proper time we shall have occasion 
to examine this reduction of the finite self to mere ap- 
pearance. For the contrast is not between subjective 
states and a sense-apprehended reality, but between all 
articulate experience as known to human beings and a 
supposed absolute experience which is general and all- 
inclusive, and at the same time, in a sense, all-exclusive. 
This absolute experience must do service for two con- 
trasting ideas, namely, for the being who has the experi- 


158 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


ence and for that which he experiences. The resulting 
confusions are limited only by the finiteness of human 
wit. If one should go through Bradley’s book and col- 
lect into one group all the passages that manifestly refer 
to the knowing self; into another group, all that refer to 
the sense world as knowledge; into still another group, 
all that refer to the ultimate source of stimulation; one 
would have three groups each fairly coherent internally. 
Then if one should organize these three groups into a 
whole in which selfhood as a creative power is recog- 
nized, and the universe of knowledge treated as the expe- 
rience of selves under control of an ultimate power, one 
might avoid Bradley's paradoxes. But this is just what 
Bradley fails to do; hence he is unable to answer our 
question. 

Bosanquet moves in the general direction here indi- 
cated as yielding more satisfactory results than those of 
Bradley. But he never quite frees himself from the 
consequences of treating selfhood as a mere transient and 
all but negligible manifestation of the Absolute. This 
prevents his reaching a consistent view of external reality. 
Royce comes still closer, as we shall see when we consider 
the doctrine of the self, and approximates the conclusions 
to which our own reflections bring us. As our problem 
is sharply defined and must be settled not by appeal to 
the authority of great names, but by discovering the pos- 
sibilities in the situations themselves, we shall seem to do 
scant justice to such men as Bosanquet and Royce. In 
other connections we shall have occasion to make use of 
their illuminating insights. 

At this point the mystical conception calls for a brief 
notice. “This conception allies itself with idealism rather 
than with realism. It strikingly contrasts with realism 
in its superficial aspects, yet the two extremes of doc- 
trine are strangely akin. Whereas the realist insists upon 
the independence of the real, yet tends to identify the 
real with the sense object, the mystic starts with the 
assumption that experience and reality are identical, yet 


THE ANSWER OF RECENT IDEALISM 159 


is able to tell what he means by such a statement only 
by recognizing a distinction between the knower and the 
thing known. Mystics as a rule are not much concerned 
with our specific problem. They generally affect to de- 
spise the sense world as the place of illusion, distraction, 
evil, and unreality. For them the beginning of wisdom 
lies in withdrawing one’s self from worldly thoughts and 
interests. If we would come into the immediate presence 
of reality, we must rigorously exclude the things of sense. 
Only thus can the spirit be purified and liberated and 
made fit for union with the Ineffable. 

The central idea in all this is immediacy. By this is 
meant knowledge by direct contact without the mediation 
of the senses or of thought processes. In advance of crit- 
ical reflection, even sense knowledge seems to bear the 
marks of immediacy for we are not aware of any thought 
activity in apprehending an external object. The first 
crude explanation of such experience is that we see by 
direct vision, or because of the image on the retina of 
the eye, or because effluxes of the object pass through the 
senses into the mind and are there known as a matter of 
course. While such notions have no standing among 
critical thinkers, we nevertheless do a certain violence to 
common sense when we exhibit the perceived object as 
a result of a fairly complex mental activity. What, then, 
of those experiences that seem to come to us without the 
aid of the senses, those sudden inspirations, flashes of 
insight, decisions, premonitions, convictions that give no 
hint of their mental origin, yet apparently come from 
nowhere? ‘The more vague, vast, and strange the expe- 
rience, the less it seems to be the result of thinking. The 
mystics teach that the highest mystical knowledge is 
obtainable only as one withdraws entirely from the world 
of ordinary experiences and shuts out all vagrant 
thoughts. The mind must be emptied, as it were, and 
made ready to be filled with a new content. “This may 
be accomplished in many ways. By following directions 
a certain virtuosity can be acquired in bringing about 


160 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


this condition of waking sleep or of ecstasy. The expe- 
riences that come to one in such a state are for the most 
part inexpressible, but only because ordinary language 
carries none but ordinary meanings, and these experiences 
are not ordinary. 

Much has been written to account for these experi- 
ences without resorting to the hypothesis of immediacy; 
but the success of such explanations is not quite complete. 
At least they do not satisfy the mystically inclined. Per- 
haps we approximate the truth when we say that the 
mystical in experience is just that part which has not 
yet been subjected to analysis and hence escapes full 
expression in language. As there is very little in sense 
knowledge that has not been analyzed or recognized as 
analyzable, we do not think of such knowledge as mys- 
tical. But as we advance to the more subtle, complex, 
and unusual experiences we find more that defies effort to 
separate into elements, more that refuses to be reduced 
to law. Hence the mystic is at home among the ideas 
that are inconceivably vast in their possible scope and 
complexity. The supreme idea that to the mystic includes 
all others, yet is absolute simplicity itself, is that of the 
Ineffable One. ‘This is so unlike anything in routine 
experience that we can find no words to express our mean- 
ings. We seem to be limited to telling what it is not. 
Meister Eckhart doubtless had this difficulty in mind 
when he called the Ineffable One the ‘“‘Nothing,’”’ mean- 
ing that in its plenitude of being, its absolute reality, 
it differed entirely from all derived existence. 

From the mystics we may not expect much light on 
our problem. Whatever of truth mysticism may contain 
is confined almost exclusively to the supersensuous world. 
Yet it is interesting and instructive for its very contempt 
of the external world. Like all forms of philosophical 
speculation, it is compelled to begin with sense experi- 
ence, and however negative its attitude, must in the end 
return to experience for confirmation. Why does the 
mystic abandon the perplexing problems with reference 


THE ANSWER OF RECENT IDEALISM 161 


to the nature of the physical world? In part it is be- 
cause he is primarily interested in the inner life of feeling, 
and decides that as he cannot enjoy both the inner and 
the outer in fullest measure, he will seek after the inner 
as being the more desirable. Becoming absorbed in the 
contemplation of the Ineffable One, he yearns to be free 
from all that is external, in order that he may attain the 
supreme bliss of perfect union. From the point of view 
of ordinary intelligence, he is attempting the impossible 
and owes his apparent success to his inability to divorce 
himself entirely from the influence of sense experience. 
It is safe to assume that the contents of the mystical ex- 
perience have the same general characteristics (temporal, 
spatial, substantial, qualitatively distinct experiences) as 
those that constitute our ordinary phenomenal world. 
Their strangeness results from the unusual conditions 
under which they occur. The credulity that accepts them 
as immediate deliverances of the ultimate source of all 
truth is likely to make one a victim of wild vagaries. 
The basal assumption of mysticism, that the Ineffable 
One is the all-encompassing reality and there is no other, 
would seem to yield the inference that the outside world 
about us is either the expression of his will or else the 
resistless outgoings of his nature. In either case it should 
not be lightly esteemed. “The mystic would reply that 
the outside world is illusory, the reflection of our finitude 
and limitations. We are being fed on illusions until we 
are able to enter into immediate union with the Ultimate 
and lose ourselves in its infinity. This may mean that 
our sense world has no such reality as its abiding source. 
But illusion it certainly is not, when taken for what it is, 
a world of changing experience. Mysticism, by dwelling 
so continuously upon the exclusive reality of the ulti- 
mate unity, leaves us with a sense of its own unreality. 
As soon as we neglect either type of reality, the produc- 
tive or the phenomenal, the other begins to fade and 
become doubtful. Hence mysticism seems to have the 


162 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


haziness of a half-forgotten dream. One would expect 
it to appeal for the most part to quietistic dreamers. 

While this has been the case in the Orient, many West- 
ern mystics have proved themselves not only keen of 
mind, but fearlessly aggressive champions of freedom and 
progress. Mysticism appeals in an indefinite way to 
what is noblest and best in human nature. But just as 
the realist insists that the external world is independently 
real, though he cannot tell much about its nature, so the 
mystic assures us that the things of the spirit alone are 
real and thereby cuts himself off from the richest sources 
of spiritual knowledge. In the realist and the mystic 
we have, as intimated, the two extremes which tend to 
meet. [he realist would save his doctrine of independence 
by translating it into a type of immediacy; and the 
mystic, in trying to make articulate what he believes he 
has discovered, uses the very resources of mediation on 
which the doctrine of independence is based. The diffi- 
culty of keeping these two opposite thought movements 
apart leads to much that is dramatic in the history of 
philosophy. Both enter into our experience, and neither 
has exclusive rights in the domain of theory. We can 
thus see a direct connection between their one-sidedness 
and their inability to answer our question about the 
nature of the real in the world of sense. 

From the foregoing discussion the relation of mysticism 
to idealism is evident. Contrasts between the two are 
superficially impressive. Nevertheless the mystical empha- 
sis on experience brings them into closest affiliation. 
Articulate the experience and we have the experience 
world; ask the cause of the experience and we must refer 
to the ultimate reality. 


CHAPTER V 
CRITICISM AND CONCLUSION 


The true view of the status of the external world must 
provide for a knowledge of that world, must leave intact 
our sense of its reality, and must take over into itself all 
that makes the other views plausible. Each theory in 
meeting some of these requirements is partly true; each 
reveals its inadequacy by failing at a critical point. Our 
theory must carry us through to the end of all demands 
and while doing so reveal the reasons why rival theories 
fail. 

We have seen that realism emphasizes analysis as the 
instrument of knowledge and draws the apparently arbi- 
trary and ultimately pernicious conclusion that the ele- 
ments thus reached are separate realities having only ex- 
ternal relations. This necessitates such an extreme view 
of independence that the realist’s world, in spite of 
asseverations to the contrary, resolves itself into an in- 
finite multiplicity of isolated units which as such are 
strictly unknowable. Each realist wrestles with this dif- 
ficulty in his own way, and each succeeds in proportion 
as he transcends the initial assumption. “To admit the 
validity of thought synthesis for reality would obviate 
the difficulty, as not a few of the realists see, but it would 
also require a revision of the doctrine of independence. 
More than this, it would imply the recognition of other 
than intellectual structures in reality as apprehended in 
experience. This reality would be saturated with emo- 
tional and conative elements. 

Only by an effort of abstraction do we isolate the in- 
tellectual aspects, and make of them simulacra of things. 


163 


164 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


We might say, then, that in general the root difficulty 
with realism is its false interpretation of intellectual 
processes. ‘These processes are all indispensable to knowl- 
edge, but they are not so much experience of reality as 
activities about or upon experience. They reveal, at best, 
only the structure of reality, not its content, which is 
almost wholly conative. Realism, as abstract rationalism, 
transcends the emptiest subjectivism only by positing, 
without logical warrant, the independent reality of the 
thought content. Then follow those impossible corolla- 
ries about the reality of dream objects, illusions, and 
abstract universals. “The end is scepticism of knowledge. 
All the excellent work done by the realists in the analysis 
of concepts will have to be taken over and utilized in the 
final synthesis; but their exclusive rationalism must be 
transcended, and the non-rational elements in experience 
recognized. 

When we come to mysticism we find that the difficulty 
is almost exactly the same as in the case of realism. The 
two types of thought while sharply contrasting are mani- 
festly complementary, and both move in the realm of 
abstraction. Mysticism is realism taking refuge from 
itself. It is rationalism shunting away from its own 
inevitable consequences and denying its nature. Hence 
we see the mystic glorying in his paradoxes, exulting in 
the contradictions of rationalism, and concluding, not 
to the limitations as well as the value of knowledge, but 
to the fatuity of all thinking. Like realism, mysticism 
uses reason to defend conclusions that cancel reason. But 
mysticism looks in one direction, realism in another. 
They, therefore, seem to be at opposite poles, yet each 
turns inevitably to the other in the moment of need be- 
cause they are essentially so near of kin. ‘They are af- 
flicted with the same one-sidedness. Mysticism yields a 
kind of knowledge not perhaps otherwise obtainable, but 
it is a knowledge of the more unusual resources of mental 
functioning. ‘This is supposed to be immediate intuition, 
whereas it is the result of forcing the mind by systematic 


CRITICISM AND CONCLUSION 165 


inhibitions to break out in novel forms of self-expression. 
The resulting information is primarily of psychological 
interest. It is no more knowledge of reality than is any 
other subjective activity. But it is intuitive. 

What do we mean by intuitive knowledge? It is the 
knowledge that transcends the merely intellectual. This 
does not make it peculiar or especially trustworthy. All 
knowledge of reality is intuitive in this sense. To take 
an extreme instance, the simple experience of change in- 
volves not only intellectual elements, such as fixation of 
successive experiences and their arrangement in a deter- 
minable order, but also the feeling of difference in passing 
along the succession. ‘The feeling of change is intuitive; 
yet without the fixations and the arrangement, the feeling 
of change would not arise. 

We may say, then, in general, that what the mystic 
seeks as a corrective of a too exclusive intellectualism is 
this very feeling element. Whenever this element is prom- 
inent in experience, it seems to bring reality especially 
near. ‘This is the secret of the doctrine of immediacy. 
It also suggests the reason why the more occult and un- 
usual experiences seem to be more immediate, and so more 
real. The intellectual processes of fixation, analysis, and 
arrangement come between our immediate sense data and 
what we consider our workaday knowledge. “The more 
we think, the more we separate ourselves from the sense 
of immediate apprehension. In calling attention to this 
feeling element in knowledge and in opening up unusual 
resources of self-expression, mysticism has a valuable con- 
tribution to make. All that is true in it, however, can 
be taken over in our final synthesis. 

Mysticism is essentially a form of idealism, as has been 
said. In emphasizing the sense of immediacy, it has 
called attention to the element in experience easily over- 
looked, namely, that the real is in its very being like our- 
selves. [he real mirrors selfhood. While the apprehen- 
sion of the real is immediate, it yet involves most intri- 
cate activity of an intellectual, conative and affective 


166 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


character. Idealism so-called centers our attention on the 
activities rather than the immediacy. It is instructive to 
note that whenever the idealist is hard pressed by virtue 
of his too exclusive concern with the intellectual struc- 
ture of reality, he turns to mysticism for salvation. But 
mysticism cannot save him until it transcends the amor- 
phically mystical and issues in a doctrine of selfhood. 
‘The type of idealism that we have looked into suffers 
as much as realism from the rationalistic bias. “The ideal 
of system is so dominant that, for Bradley, it seems to 
become itself the reality. At no point in the development 
of his argument does he draw the distinction in a satis- 
factory way between the reality as a system and the reality 
which is manifested in the system. ‘The nearest he comes 
to this is in the chapter devoted to the meanings of self.t 
But there he makes the “‘subjective’’ self a sort of thing- 
by-itself, and the world of experience a mere accompani- 
ment. He has no difficulty in multiplying contradictions 
in such a combination of incompatibilities. “Che assump- 
tion that controls his criticism of our fundamental con- 
cepts is that the reality which contrasts with “‘appearance’ 
must be extra-mental. “Thus in condemning the relation 
of substance to attribute? as shot through with contra- 
dictions, he fails to see that the contradictions fall away 
when we take the two as mere aspects of our complex 
experience and as answering two several needs in our 
mental economy. As aspects, they are different; as inde- 
pendent realities, they would be contradictions. Such 
ambiguities recur with monotonous persistence through- 
out the sinuous and labored argument. The two char- 
acteristic weaknesses of Bradleyan idealism—the apoth- 
eosis of system, which rules out the self as real, and the 
assumption that the only real which can contrast with 
“appearance” must be extra-mental—follow from his 
intellectualism. The mystical element in the final con- 


1 Appearance and Reality, chap. ix. 
2 Ibid., chap. ii. 


CRITICISM AND CONCLUSION 167 


ception of reality as experience in general is the attempt 
of intellectualism to recover itself. 

But absolute idealism is not the only type that has 
found currency. It is the extreme form because it tries 
to carry through consistently the purpose to see reality 
as idea. In so far as it is strictly logical, it fails to tran- 
scend the theoretical goal of science as regards system. 
Other idealisms differ more or less, as they take over 
features of what is now being called personalism, or activ- 
ism, or voiuntarism, or ethical idealism. Such labels are 
of little value in differentiating the various types of cur- 
rent idealism. Each lends itself with ready facility to a 
broader and a narrower meaning. But the important 
feature in all these idealisms is their more or less definite 
recognition of the self as actively codperating with the 
ultimate source of stimulation in constructing our sense 
world. In proportion as the idealistic conception of the 
world recognizes the decisive role played by selfhood, 
both in the source of stimulation and in the finite power 
of response, the intellectualistic conclusions become trans- 
formed into conceivably concrete realities. We need not 
now examine these improved forms of idealism; they 
may be studied (in English) in the works of Bosanquet, 
Sorley, Pringle-Pattison, Royce, Ward, Sir Henry Jones, 
Bowne, Calkins, and Wildon Carr. Only when we rec- 
ognize the full significance of the distinction between the 
self as knower and the world as response, can we dis- 
engage the tangled threads of realistic-mystic-idealistic 
thought skeins and make of them a coherent world-view. 
How this can be done we shall now indicate in broad 
outline. 

As the realist refuses to recognize the essentially 
dynamic relation between the self and the source of stim- 
ulation whereby the objective world is seen to be their 
joint product, he is compelled to defend an impossible 
conception of independence, to reduce the self to con- 
sciousness and consciousness to a relation. By this time 
his whole system explodes because of its inherent contradic- 


168 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


tions, Restore the true relation between the source of 
stimulation and the self, and every realistic motive finds its 
rightful place in the world scheme. Independence as ap- 
plied to the external world comes to mean controlled re- 
sponse by the self to the activity of an independent power, 
relations are recognized as being external or internal accord- 
ing to the evidence of experience, reality falls plainly into 
two classes, one of which includes the source of stimulation 
and the finite selves, while the other includes the phe- 
nomenal world and all mental states whatsoever. Accept- 
ing this distinction, we can without prejudice determine 
the nature of the reality in experience by a direct exami- 
nation of experience itself. 

We may say much the same of mysticism. By finally 
abandoning reason and trusting to the unregulated vaga- 
ries of trance or of what is little more than autohypnotic 
states, mysticism closes the door to the possibility of a 
coherent world conception. Its doctrine of immediacy 
can at best give only the bare fact of presence, whereas 
what we want to know is the nature of this presence 
and what its relations are to ourselves and the world. 
The mystic, because of his rejection of selfhood as con- 
creted reason and will, misses the goal of philosophic 
insight, and is always in danger of plunging into the 
abyss of pantheism. He is near the truth, and needs only 
to carry out the implicit logic of his vision to reach it. 
His immediacy then becomes spontaneity or subconscious 
response; his truth, reasoned assurance; and his reality, 
selves and their world-constructing activity. 

Idealism is so much committed to the personalistic con- 
ception of the world that it fails to reach that conception 
only by the subtle working of the oft-exposed prejudice 
in favor of objectivity. Bradley, for instance, repeatedly 
speaks as if he fully grasped the possibilities of person- 
alism, only to shy away and turn to the conception of 
an absolute which, being all things, is nothing. 

We are now ready to return to our question as to the 
nature of external reality. Scientific thought, in its utmost 


CRITICISM AND CONCLUSION 169 


reach of theoretical insight, sees the world as system, but 
is unable to construe the implications of this view. As 
mere system, the world is pure process, hence can have 
no abiding reality. But without abiding reality, the 
world cannot be even process. Hence there must be more 
than system. When, over against the system, we recog- 
nize selves for whom and by whom the system exists, 
we are able to locate and characterize the real in the 
system. ‘To find that real we need not arbitrarily think 
of the external world as independent, or as illusory, or 
as idea (intellectually considered), but can take it for 
what it appears to be in sense perception. It is a world 
of physical things which have their reality in being the 
concrete responses of the mind to stimulations. They are 
what the stimulations mean to the mind. They exist only 
because the mind attends, becomes interested, evaluates. 
Hence we can now say with assurance that the reality in 
the world-system is essentially value-content. Intellectu- 
ally the world is system, practically it is value. Its reality 
is therefore a practical element read into the thought struc- 
ture. 

The doctrine that external reality is value gathers into 
itself what is best in the various types of philosophy that 
we have been reviewing. [he utmost reach of realism 
was the doctrine of essence. [his is very close to the 
doctrine that reality is value. Both make reality a uni- 
versal in so far as reality has a logical structure. Both 
deny reality to things as extra-~-mental and affirm it only 
of meanings. But the doctrine that reality is value goes 
beyond its rival in asserting that the reality is more than 
logical structure; it is something that can be lived, some- 
thing that affects us for good or ill, that makes a difference 
to us, and is equally real in all its distinguishable features. 
In this sense value has objectivity only because it is 
through and through and altogether human. Further- 
more value is so dependent on human factors, so com- 
pletely the expression of human interests, that it has a 
certain immediacy akin to the mystical experience. As all 


170 WORLD OF ORGANIZED KNOWLEDGE 


experience begins in sense perception value is primarily 
intuitive; it is the sense object as directly apprehended. 
On this foundation of elemental values we build our 
world of derivative values, just as science builds its world 
of concepts and laws on data furnished by sense percep- 
tion. Finally the doctrine that reality is value is the 
essence of the idealism that has not lost its way. To call 
reality experience is meaningless unless it is the experience 
of some intelligence; but as such it is value. Within this 
idealistic doctrine we distinguish between the cosmic 
reality, which is our experience extended in time and 
space by legitimate inference, and the reality of immedi- 
ate perception—both are values. We distinguish also 
between experience as ‘‘pure sentiency,’ to use Bradley’s 
phrase, and the articulated results of thinking about 
experience—both are values. 

Experience is never an undifferentiated whole except as 
a logical abstraction; but as articulated it is always further 
analyzable into smaller units, till in the end it disappears 
into process. But this analysis can be stayed, not by de- 
claring that the reality is undifferentiated experience, but 
by recognizing the integrating value elements in objects. 
As value every object is an ultimate unity. “To analyze it 
is to destroy it in its concreteness, but to exhibit it at the 
same time as a logical structure. ‘“[hus we see that all 
lines in our thinking lead to the doctrine that reality in 
the external world is value. 

We are now ready to pass to our next theme, The 
World as Value. Our main task will be not so much to 
explain the doctrine of value as to protect it from accre- 
tions and perversions and diremptions that virtually 
negate it. If we could approach it with a mind free from 
those prepossessions born of the objective attitude, we 
could hardly help appreciating the truth of the value doc- 
trine, not as a conclusion but as an immediate apprehen- 
sion. ‘The only reality we know is the reality we live. 
It enters into our experience and makes a difference with 
us; it is value. 


BAR Svat 
TIE GW ORDISRAS  VATCUOR 


CHAPTER I 
SUMMARY OF ARGUMENT PRO AND CON 


In the preceding discussions we examined the structure 
of the world as experience and found that it is a joint 
product of stimulation and response; that the response 
involves a fairly complex constructive work on the part 
of the mind; that only the completed sense object enters 
into consciousness; that with advancing experience we 
are able to develop the distinction between objective fact 
and illusion or between truth and error; that the world 
is replete with values in a cosmic matrix of conditions 
and relations; that the special task of science is to master 
the conditions for reaching or avoiding the value-content 
of reality; and that when the scientific results are mistaken 
for the reality, we reach an impasse from which we can 
emerge only by restoring the value elements as the reality 
in the system. 

We saw how many lines converge on this conclusion. 
To begin with, the so-called categories of sense perception 
are all of practical significance. Substance appears to be 
a device for satisfying the felt need for permanence in 
the midst of the incipient experiences that follow one 
another in rapid succession. Change is our way of uniting 
the states of a substance into an abiding unity. Cause 
is a further effort to hold events together and make them 
manageable for practical ends. In like manner each of 
the other aspects of our experience world has its unique 
significance in the economy of life. 

Again we saw how the mind builds its elaborate scien- 
tific structure out of universals, whose only excuse for 


171 


Mye2 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


being is their value in manipulating nature; how, too, 
this scientific activity, as logically completed, issues in a 
dynamic view of the world in which all that is lacking 
to make it work is that which value alone can supply. 
This became still more evident when we examined the 
representative attempts to find the real of experience in 
something other than value. These attempts failed in 
so far as they, on the part of the realists, implied that 
the external reality was independent of the knower; or, 
on the part of the mystics, assumed that sense knowledge 
was illusory because it separated thought and thing; or, 
on the part of the absolute idealists, identified the real 
with mere sentient experience. 

But each of these attempts suggested in its own way 
what seems to us the true or adequate answer. ‘he 
realist’s independent reality could become known only 
in so far as it entered into dynamic relation with the 
knower. As it thus had to come into consciousness, it 
could have any degree of complexity, dependent on the 
capacity and interest of the apprehending mind. ‘The 
independence belonged, not to the external thing, but 
to the source of stimulation. The mystical identity of 
thought and thing only emphasized the non-independence 
of the thing. In trying to make out what such an identity 
could mean, the mystic was compelled to distinguish the 
thought process from the thought content. “The content 
then became, as in the realistic view, a function of dis- 
criminative attention. 

Finally the idealist’s contention that reality is experi- 
ence reset the problem, and suggested that the articula- 
tions in experience depend on the mind’s interest. Pre- 
occupation with the task of formulating a view of the 
world as a thought structure prevented the absolutist 
from seeing that the reality as apprehended is value- 
content and nothing else. In calling it “‘appearance,’’ the 
idealist did not deny that it has value, but contended that 
it is not for the absolute what it is for us. This con- 
tention may well be granted without prejudice to our 


ARGUMENT PRO AND CON 173 


own conclusion, But it means, not that we have illusion, 
but that our grasp of truth is partial and needs supple- 
mentation. In so far as the absolutist recognizes the 
reality of articulations in experience, he makes the char- 
acter of the external world dependent on the mind’s 
capacity to attend. 

In addition to these lines of evidence we found two 
corroborative suggestions. One was, that all tests of 
truth are practical; they have to do exclusively with value- 
judgments. “The other was that judgments of rationality 
are also value-judgments. “This second statement deserves 
a further word. Unless we find in an enterprise a value 
that makes the effort worth while, we question its ration- 
ality. What determines our plan of action is a value; 
what we use to attain our end is a nexus of values; what 
rewards us at the completion of our efforts is a value. 
All ideals, whether cognitive, ethical, esthetic or religious, 
are ‘plans of action’’—values to be attained. “Thus from 
every quarter of our experience universe we get evidence 
that value has a reality as strictly objective as the reality 
of the apparently independent world and in the same 
sense. 

This enables us to draw the conclusion that the real 
is just what it reports itself to be, what we must think it 
if we are to attain to the needful insight into the course 
of events. The complexity of the thing measures our 
interest in it. In view of its manifestly answering other 
needs besides those at any moment uppermost, we form 
the conception of a thing that is distinct from and vastly 
richer than our immediate thought of it. But this sup- 
posed real thing is itself a thought; nor is it very definite 
as it looms in the background of our interests. As an 
ideal it is never wholly realized. In contrast, the concrete 
thing is always that which stands before us at any given 
moment. 

What is thus true of sense objects is even more evi- 
dently true of scientific constructions. In science every 
conclusion is determined by the ideal or interest to be 


BAA THE WORLD AS VALUE 


conserved. ‘The primal need is that of consistency; the 
laws of thought must be obeyed, contradictions elimi- 
nated, and the parts so related as to form a harmonious 
whole. ‘To ignore these laws would land us in confu- 
sion and mental bewilderment. But they are the laws 
of thought, not of things, except as things are thought. 
They are a practical demand to which the course of 
events in nature is indifferent. [hat is, in a changing 
world where every event is unique, the laws of consis- 
tency have no meaning. ‘This is only another way of 
saying that scientific entities are but working models, 
practical devices for manipulating nature, and are instru- 
mental throughout. Our cognitive interests determine 
what kind of order will satisfy us, and the same interests 
guide us in manipulating sense data till we attain our 
desired goal. 

But difficulties and misunderstandings throng about 
the conclusion that external reality is exhaustively defined 
as value. ‘These have thus far been scarcely more than 
suggested; we must now face them in their full strength. 
A very general objection might run as follows: After 
all nothing has been accomplished by your argument fur- 
ther than to define the two expressions, external reality 
and value, in such a way as to make them identical in 
meaning. ‘Ihe cosmic universe is as indifferent to human 
interests as it ever was. You must either humanize the 
universe—whatever that might mean—or dehumanize the 
notion of value, if you would bring them together; and 
if this could be done, the result would be a mere product 
of logical manipulation and would deceive nobody. This 
criticism is difficult to meet, principally because it so com- 
pletely ignores or misapprehends the argument thus far 
developed. At the same time it confuses the issue. Unless 
the conclusion that reality is value does furnish additional 
insight, unless it does make a difference in our outlook 
upon life and does affect conduct, it is utterly empty. 

The criticism is really a misleading statement of the 
truth, and when taken in its proper context may be made 


ARGUMENT PRO AND CON 17D 


to help establish the conclusion it would discount or set 
aside. Experience does and does not remain the same. 
The sameness inheres only in the general features of ex- 
perience. Every particular feature, when viewed as value- 
content, takes on a new significance; or we might say, only 
then does it acquire significance. Our conclusion brings 
objective reality within the human realm and makes it, 
throughout, the expression of selfhood. ‘The material 
world is viewed no longer as something alien and anti- 
thetical to spirit, but as of the very essence of spiritual 
activity. Moreover it is a great gain just to lift the real 
in experience above the possibility of dissolution by in- 
exorable logic. “This saves us from intellectual embarrass- 
ment if not something close to intellectual suicide. While 
it does not change the laws of nature, that is, the condi- 
tions we must meet to attain our ends, it makes the attain- 
ing of those ends more worth while. Nature as the ex- 
pression of selfhood is seen to be the instrument of self- 
realization. 

Yet this significance for the self may easily become a 
stumbling block to the acceptance of the conclusion. It 
may lead the sceptic back to the theory that after all 
values are essentially subjective. This finds plausible 
support in some very practical considerations. In the 
struggle to obtain the goods of life, man has been met on 
every hand by resistance to be overcome, forces to be 
subdued, thwartings and limitations innumerable. This 
necessity of putting forth effort, of exercising ingenuity 
and harnessing apparently unwilling forces, naturally sug- 
gests that the values belong to the subjective realm while 
the difficulties in the way of realizing them are objective 
and alien. We may critically dispose of this naive view, 
yet we feel its influence long after it is discarded as theo- 
retically untenable. It is much like the impression still 
strong within us that the heavenly bodies form a daily 
procession about the earth. [he one is as harmless as 
the other until a question of theoretical interest arises; 
then the naive view must be set aside. 


176 THE ‘WORLD (AS (VALUE 


But to the popular mind the most formidable objec- 
tion, as already pointed out, lies in the extreme variable- 
ness of values. ‘They vary for the individual evaluator 
with his moods and tenses, attitudes and interests. In 
contrast, the thing as physical thing may remain relatively 
the same while it passes through a wide gamut of value- 
differences, dependent on subjective conditions. ‘To iden- 
tify reality with value seems from this point of view to 
set up the most capricious, intangible, aura-like element in 
the thing as its most substantial and abiding feature. 
Moreover values in the large vary with degrees of culture, 
native capacity, and those broad differences that distin- 
guish age from age, nation from nation, community from 
community. The case seems strong against reality’s 
being value. 

But we need to remember that variableness permeates 
all experience. “The only persisting element in our expe- 
rience world is the generalized content. “The nearer we 
approach the limit of concreteness and individuality, the 
more of change and movement we find. Were it not for 
the logical work of fixating and constructing, we should 
have no substantiality whatever in our world. In the 
same way that permanence attaches itself to things it may 
accrue also to values. or instance, the beauty of a land- 
scape has the same constancy of character as the landscape 
itself—-which in its definite features is changing contin- 
ually. We hardly incline to call an object beautiful unless 
under changing conditions it continues to excite zsthetic 
emotion. Hence we are usually somewhat uncertain 
whether the beauty resides in the thing or in the observer. 
But utility values seem different. “They vary with the 
immediate interest. An object of use like a car is valuable 
for various purposes. It may be an object of indifference 
till we want its services, then it takes on a temporary value, 
that is, it becomes valuable for that particular service. 
What could be more transient? Yet we must remind our- 
selves again that the car as an object of apprehension 
varies quite as much. When it is of little concern to us 


ARGUMENT PRO AND CON Wis 


it may appear as a mere blur of light and shade and color 
which we vaguely feel to be an object identifiable at will. 
The more interested we become the more definite becomes 
for us the car. Just as it may be identified in an ex- 
tremely vague way, when little in our thoughts, so its 
values can be more or less before our mind as possibilities, 
even though not realized at the time. Just as we generalize 
on the different appearances of the car and give it thereby 
a constancy of character, so we can consider the various 
values of the car as forming.a whole and yielding a per- 
manent balance of serviceableness as against expense of 
upkeep. In other words we can treat values, actual and 
potential, exactly as we do things, considered as mere 
objects. 

But can we carry this parallelism over into the world 
that is shared by all, the world that fills immensity and 
covers an illimitable past? Our ideas about the world 
that lies beyond the reach of actual experience are the 
results of inference from meager data, and hence are nec- 
essarily both general and inaccurate; yet this construct of 
the mind satisfies the intellectual needs that reach beyond 
the here and now of experience. “There is no reason why 
we should not treat values in the same way. What, for 
instance, is the value of a given star to an observer? Very 
little, unless he wants to know something about it, admire 
its beauty, or learn of its size, chemical constitution, its 
telation to other stars, distance from our solar system, 
or what not. Let the interest be slight or shifting, and 
the star itself would be correspondingly vague and vari- 
ous. Just as we think of the star and every other object 
in the phenomenal world as indefinitely more complex 
than any one appearance of it, so the world has a vast 
surplusage of values which we for the most part ignore 
or are ignorant of. [They await discovery. This 
means that they await the sense of need which will call 
them into being. Wherever knowledge reaches, there 
values are created. In organizing the material universe 
into a scientific system, we actually construct a scheme of 


178 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


values. ‘The system as scientifically accurate is throughout 
value, and all its actual foundations in experience are 
severally values. 

In viewing the world as a system of values, we should 
keep in mind the problem of their objectivity, as meaning 
their trustworthiness in meeting both individual and social 
tests. The parallelism then becomes throughgoing be- 
tween the objectivity of the world regarded as things and 
the objectivity of the world regarded as values. In both 
cases it is validity in a common experience world that is 
decisive. Values meet the test exactly as do material 
aspects of things, for material aspects turn out to be, in 
fact, aspects of value. For purposes of manipulation, then, 
it is a matter of indifference whether we call external reality 
value or substance or energy or any other usable term. 
But when we seek insight the case is different. A recog- 
nition that the reality of this world in which we live is 
value transforms it from an opaque mystery into a human 
world full of meaning. 

Viewing the world as value, we can explain many pop- 
ular misconceptions and bring into relief the truth they 
contain. We can see more clearly now why people intent 
on practical ends should come to look upon physical ob- 
jects as mere passive things endowed with active energies; 
why these things along with their resident energies should 
be so weak to resist resolution into mere process; why 
such desperate measures should have been resorted to in 
the effort to save the real in the phenomenal world from 
disappearing into nothingness or the dark unknowable; 
why many thinkers at this point should despair of a sat- 
isfactory solution by intellectual means and fall back on 
mystical intuition; why finally the primal distinction, 
implied in all sense perception, between the source of stim- 
ulation and the percipient’s response, should be misunder- 
stood. As this misunderstanding has been and is at 
present the breeding place of persistent difficulties and 
confusions, it is worth noting how the theory that reality 
is value serves as a corrective. If we assume that values 


ARGUMENT PRO AND CON Av 


alone are objectively real, then the objective world exists 
only for an evaluator. This points, on the one hand, to 
the creative activity of the self who evaluates, and on the 
other, to the codperative activity of a power, distinct from 
both the self and the world of values, yet vitally con- 
cerned in both. 

The conception of nature to which we have come is 
that of a nexus of values. Just as we say that in nature 
there is no absolute vacuum, so we may say that no por- 
tion of nature is devoid of values. But to maintain this 
position we must recognize two kinds of value, positive 
or desired, and negative or undesired. [he values that 
pack the world are of varicus character and usability. 
When we want a value that is near at hand, it may be 
obtained so easily as to seem a free gift of nature. When 
we want a value embedded in other values which must 
be set aside, the work involved makes us think of nature 
as grudging. But in every situation, the values them- 
selves are absolutely free, and there is not a trace of resist- 
ance, except as the way to them may be over or through 
other values not at the time desired. It is because we 
make>these~choices and insist on having what we want 
rather than what is easily accessible that difficulties and 
thwartings and oppositions are encountered. [he values 
that are in the way of the ones we want are classed as 
negative—till the time comes when they too may be de- 
sired. Our limited range of knowledge is responsible for 
our not being able to utilize more of nature’s values. 

The scientific study of nature has brought to light a 
vast range and variety of values never before suspected. _ 


*‘More servants wait on man 
Than he'll take notice of.’’ 


The multiplication of values makes nature bewilderingly 
rich to the modern man. Along with the increase of 
actual values has come a great reduction of cost in the 
labor of obtaining them. ‘The negative values or the ills 
and discomforts of life have also been the subject of 


180 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


scientific study, with the result that a great variety of 
evils, intellectual and physical, have been eliminated. But 
the very complexity of life tends to develop undesirable 
intensities and distractions. Science has forced man to 
exercise more care and intelligence in the utilization of 
values, and has thereby further developed and refined 
man’s capacity to appreciate. Thus as civilization ad- 
vances, values multiply, capacities to enjoy are brought 
into exercise, nature becomes more subservient, and its 
stings and poisons are neutralized. “The negative values 
are so often converted into positive ones as to suggest that, 
if we knew all, we might eliminate negative values en- 
tirely. It is well known that most negative values have 
in them a positive value-element, as when an evil endured 
calls our attention to a good we should not otherwise 
have found. For the sake of simplicity, we shall, unless 
otherwise expressly stated, limit ourselves to the discussion 
of the positive values. Later when the problem of evil 
begins to trouble us, we shall have to consider the world 
of negative values. 

Values not only have an inherent quality whereby they 
affect us emotionally, but they may also help in obtaining 
other goods. When a value is more desired for its service- 
ableness in obtaining other goods than for itself, it is 
called an instrumental value. “Thus a large bank account 
or conveniences of travel are primarily instrumental values, 
while friends and beautiful objects are intrinsic values. 
But no object is entirely devoid of either type of value. 
The capacity to enjoy values recognized as desirable de- 
pends on the attitude and condition of the self. For in- 
stance, if there is a lack of inner harmony, owing to a 
wrong attitude (e.g. a bad conscience), the good that may 
be desired will yield only a part of its wonted value. 
This thought cannot here be developed; but when we 
come to study the ethical life, we may see that the de- 
pendence of appreciation on the attitude of the self is 
the key to some of our most troublesome problems. In- 
strumental values should of course never usurp the place 


ARGUMENT PRO AND CON 181 


of those that are intrinsic. In general we may say that 
the values which can be shared with others and which 
grow more valuable to the possessor as they are shared 
are almost entirely intrinsic. Such are the ideal values of 
social intercourse and mutual helpfulness. 

The first thing that impresses one in studying the 
world of values is that it is a manifold of universes, each 
limitless in extent and corresponding to a fundamental 
interest of the self. There are four of these universes. 

(1) The world of cognitive values. “These are mani- 
festly all-encompassing. We study nature from every 
conceivable point of view in the interest of knowledge. 
While the cele of aes es may furnish our initial 


Thus the field of possible ieeeinere is an intricate com- 
plex of both instrumental and intrinsic values. This is 
the world of science and philosophy. It appears as or- 
derly, analyzable, responsive to logical manipulation, 
transparent to reason; it is the world of description and 
interpretation. Pech alk 

) e world of Be enetic values. When our in- 
terest centers in the emotional satisfactions that accom- 
pany the mere contemplation of an object, the emotion 
is called xsthetic, and the object that awakens it is called 
beautiful. Like the cognitive, the exsthetic values are 
all-embracing. By this is meant that every object and 


every situation within experience is capable, under proper 


a 


conditions, of stimulating “the xsthetic sense in varying 


degree, though a person “may not always be in a mood 
to appreciate this quality in things. 

(3) The world of moral values. These include the 
whole range of values considered as affecting human wel- 
fare. They arise whenever we are called upon to make 
a choice. As most goods have to be earned or obtained 
by effort, it is of prime importance to know which goods 
are most worth while, and how goods are related to one 
another. This study forms the basis of rational choice. 


182 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


Practically every situation in life presents competing al- 
ternatives which require us to make decisions of moral 
significance. [Throughout our conscious life we are nec- 
essarily exercising the moral prerogative. There is no 
escape, for we choose when we refuse to choose. The 
moral quality resides not in the goods themselves, but in. 
the attitude we sustain toward them. Hence moral 
values are related to other values in much the same way 
as the scientific structure of concepts, laws, and formulae 
are related to the concrete objects of experience. 

(4) The world of religious values. Religious values 
emerge when we become interested in the future of 
values, and in the grounds of belief in their ultimate con- 
servation. [his study involves especially a consideration 
of our destiny as the appreciators and in a sense the origi- 
nators of value. “Through the study of experience in all 
its aspects we may come to the conclusion that the ulti- 
mate Power manifested in the universe is the Giver of all 
the goods we enjoy. ‘Ihe consciousness, then, of being 
in his favor and of belonging to him in a filial sense, is 
the essence of religion. From this point of view, every 
object within our ken associates itself with the ultimate 
Source of good, and the world becomes throughout a 
universe of religious values. 

Thus to the four great interests of life correspond the 
four types of value in our objective world. Besides 
these, or rather included in them and representing more 
restricted fields, are such varieties of value as the social, 
economic, educational. These all yield a world of 
values as extensive as the reach of our interest, and help 
to constitute the objects of our experience. Hence the 
external world, far from being a mere aggregate or sys- 
tem of inert and dead things, is instinct with values as 
various and rich as the capacities of the evaluating self. 
The world grows as the self develops. In carrying out 
Herbart’s wise injunction to cultivate a many-sided in- 
terest, one creates new sources of value and thereby puts 
new qualities into one’s world of objects. 


ARGUMENT PRO AND CON 183 


The grouping of values into cognitive, esthetic, moral, 
and religious is the one we shall follow in our further 
study. All values that may seem to fall outside these 
groups can by a little ingenuity be brought within their 
scope. A brief survey of each group is now in order. 
Since philosophy is primarily an attempt to satisfy cog- 
nitive interests as such, there is little need of extended 
treatment of this group separately. [hey are the theme 
of all our discussions. We have thus far sketched the 
nature of sense knowledge, and have taken one look into 
the realm of philosophical insight. Our further study 
will be almost entirely within the confines of strictly 
philosophical issues. 


CHAPTER II 
COGNITIVE VALUES 


That cognitive values are fundamental and all-inclu- 
sive is evident. Whatever value aspect in an object may 
arrest our attention we first want to know the nature 
of the object—how it acts under ordinary conditions. 
We must know in order to evaluate. Knowledge is also 
itself an evaluation. ‘The influence of the scientific atti- 
tude toward nature has led us to think of knowledge as 
restricted to intellectual apprehension, in which only 
thought structures have part. But such knowledge is 
abstract and general, whereas knowledge may include 
every element of concreteness found in our world of ap- 
preciation. As every effort to acquire knowledge is con- 
trolled by an interest (a value sought), so the character 
of the information is determined by the degree of com- 
pleteness with which we comprehend the concrete situa- 
tion as a complex of values. 

In furnishing the basis for action and determining 
what values to seek as well as what to use, knowledge is 
primarily instrumental. As such it should be accurate 
and definite up to the measure of the purpose to be real- 
ized. ‘The purpose in view determines how thorough 
shall be the analysis and the reconstruction. Fortu- 
nately our needs are so related that knowledge acquired 
in satisfying one need generally serves more or less ade- 
quately in meeting some other need. “Through long 
ages of experience and study, types of knowledge have 
been worked out that serve a maximum number of 
human needs. ‘These types constitute the race’s inherit- 
ance, passed on from age to age. [hey range from the 


184 


COGNITIVE VALUES 185 


popular wisdom of tradition to the most advanced scien- 
tific information. Whether popular or scientific this 
knowledge is all more or less limited, vague, and subject 
to revision as the interests of civilization change. The 
change, however, is far less than one might suppose. A 
new expression of the old belief often passes for a new 
belief. “Ihe ancient doctrine thus becomes quite modern 
and up-to-date. On the other hand, the same form of 
expression may conceal a variety of meanings; the same- 
ness then pertains only to the general aspects and not to 
the specific situations. “Thus we may find in ancient 
writers most if not all of the ethical principles recognized 
as valid to-day. But from age to age these principles 
have so changed their meaning and application that their 
identity consists largely in the form of their expression. 
The vagueness of the principles by which we live neces- 
sitates their reexamination by each succeeding generation. 
Truths of one period become problems for the next and 
must be reéstablished or revised. [he constant demand 
for revision makes the race inheritance not only a treasure 
to be conserved but material to be worked over. ‘This 
is a great advantage, as only by working over our stored 
intellectual wealth can we appreciate its value and make 
our contribution to it. 

Knowledge is not only of prime importance as an in- 
strument for obtaining the values of life; it is a con- 
stituent element in those values. “To know a value is to 
appreciate and enjoy it. This kind of knowledge is 
first-hand acquaintance. Popularly the term knowledge 
is reserved for second-hand information. But such 
knowledge must be assimilated; it must in a sense be- 
come a part of our experience. 

The pursuit of knowledge is itself a value, It means 
concentration of purpose and a consequent integration of 
character. It develops a devotion to actuality as against 
sham and falsity. It makes for intellectual vigor and 
power of inventiveness. In fact, it exercises all our spir- 
itual resources and thereby contributes to the higher 


186 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


ranges of self-realization. Hence in the pursuit of knowl- 
edge the goal has a luster of attractiveness that it loses to 
some extent after it is once reached. What may, as a fin- 
ished product, seem but a register of scientific or histori- 
cal items may represent the eager life-work of many in- 
vestigators who were sustained in their toil by unfailing 
joy. So spontaneous is mental activity that, when once 
awakened by some interest, it tends to draw into its 
service all other resources of the self. 

The two aspects of cognitive values, the intrinsic and 
the instrumental, are as experience inseparable. Knowl- 
edge that is thought to be in no way serviceable may be 
cherished for its own sake, but it thereby does actually 
enrich the life of the possessor. As a general thing our 
interests are so rooted in the problem of getting on in 
life that knowledge not having direct or ascertainable 
bearing on this problem tends to lose its popular appeal. 
On the other hand, knowledge comes to be cherished for 
its own sake when it proves instrumentally valuable. 
This distinction between the intrinsic and the instru- 
mental aspects of cognitive value ceases to be significant 
when we reach the higher ranges of intellectual effort. 
The satisfactions of such effort are their own excuse for 
being. 

The obvious necessity of satisfying our cognitive in- 
terests determines most of life’s problems. How to ob- 
tain the truth in a given situation—secure the pertinent 
facts and so penetrate into their inner connection and 
meaning that we may draw practically valid conclusions 
from them—this is our absorbing task. As our intellec- 
tual interests become more and more inclusive, we outrun 
our practical needs and form the ideal of an all-inclusive, 
completely unified body of knowledge. This ideal then 
becomes a kind of touchstone for testing the ultimate 
truth of any particular intellectual acquisition and starts 
the question whether any truth is wholly true, whether 
all truth is not relative. 

One who denies that we can attain to absolute truth 


COGNITIVE VALUES 187 


is usually called a sceptic or an agnostic. Such a person 
is likely to be looked upon with a certain popular dis- 
favor, but in most cases unjustly. The issue is far from 
simple. As we noticed when considering the nature of 
scientific knowledge, truth is doubly relative; it has to 
do with relations, and it is truth only for human intelli- 
gences. When the sceptic defends the doctrine of rela- 
tivity, he may have the second meaning in mind and 
then he becomes subject to destructive criticism. When 
he contends that truth is a human commodity, good for 
finite creatures like ourselves but of no validity for the 
absolute, we may reply that he must produce his absolute 
and make sure that he is right. We all have a vague 
ideal of completeness, and no one has ever come within 
sight of an ultimate limit to man’s capacity to know. 
In the nature of the case a limit recognized as such would 
thereby be transcended. So long as a belief meets our 
tests of validity, it is absolute for us. In short, all abso- 
lute knowledge must be relative to a self. Where there 
is no self, there is not only no knowledge, there is noth- 
ing that a self might conceivably learn about. 

The practical character of truth has already been 
dwelt upon. ‘Truth always has reference to an end be- 
yond itself. It is that which extricates us from intellec- 
tual perplexity or illumines some dark spot in our ex- 
perience. It is that which brings together into a rational 
order what had before seemed only externally and casu- 
ally related. Because of its essentially practical charac- 
ter, truth cannot be wholly detached from life. This 
fact is made much of by the sceptics. They argue that 
truth is a matter of the will guided by the emotions and 
prejudices. They point out that as soon as the initial 
data of sense are before us, we begin manipulating in 
order to make the data fit our preconceived notions or 
satisfy our dominant interests. Everything is trans- 
formed and distorted by our human point of view. This 
is the way Santayana, for instance, reasons in developing 
his doctrine of scepticism. By doubting whatever can 


188 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


be doubted in human beliefs, he reaches, as we have seen, 
the ultimate datum that cannot be doubted—the realm 
of essences. It is interesting to note that to believe any- 
thing concerning these essences is to infect them with the 
virus of doubt, since, for Santayana, all belief is extra- 
rational.t Nevertheless he contends that these essences 
are infinitely numerous and various, are simple in struc- 
ture, changeless, and unconnected both among them- 
selves and with the knower. ‘They are the definite sense 
data in their utter particularity, revealed for the instant 
in the act of sense perception; but as revealed, without 
duration, without local habitation in space or time, with- 
out substantiality, and without human reference of any 
sort. “The knowledge we may have of these essences is 
contemplative, not practical, though we may enjoy imag- 
inative flights into the infinite wilderness of their habi- 
tations.2. In thus depicting a world of ultimate reals 
unconnected with human interests, Santayana is simply 
deceiving himself. What he describes as the changeless, 
particular, isolated essences have all the characteristics of 
being human creations, playthings of the abstracting in- 
tellect. 

“What is truth? said jesting Pilate; and would not 
stay for an answer.’ With these words Lord Bacon be- 
gins his famous essay on truth. The question would 
forever remain unanswered if what were sought were 
something that could be detached from actual experi- 
ences and completely isolated. “Truth is always about 
something, never truth in general. When we can point 
out what is the common element in particular beliefs, we 
have reached the limit of generality. Truth then is 
truths, and they are true only in the sense that they meet 
our tests. Just as we cannot by analysis or by the method 
of doubt and elimination reach the ultimately simple of 
Santayana’s speculations, so, although by the method of 
synthesis we may reach truths of great generality, we 


1 Scepticism and Animal Faith, pp. 1-76, especially p. 35, 
2 Cf. Ibid., chap. x. 


COGNITIVE VALUES 189 


can never attain to truth in the abstract as the quintes- 
sence of all beliefs. 

The opposite of truth is error. We are all sure that 
we know what error is, for we dwell in the midst of it. 
The struggle of life is in the direction of the truth, with 
error ever present. We rest satisfied when we reach a 
degree of accuracy sufficient to make the result usable for 
the purpose in hand. Each of the sciences has its own 
more or less elaborate technique for the elimination of 
errors arising from personal bias in observation and in- 
ference, the influence of social contacts and of tradition, 
and such other sources of mental prepossession as inter- 
fere with trustworthy thinking. 

Errors are beliefs that have failed to meet the tests of 
experience. They are positive in content and refer to a 
possible world of reality. “This fact has given rise to a 
discussion whether error may not be truth misplaced. 
Is it not conceivable that, in some other world or under 
some other conditions, what is error to us might be found 
to be the veriest truth? An affirmative answer to this 
question is given by Bradley. ‘‘Error,’’ he says, “‘is con- 
tent made loose from its own reality, and related to a 
reality with which it is discrepant.’’* ‘“‘Error is truth 
when it is supplemented.’’* ‘The idea, rejected by real- 
ity, is none the less predicable when its subject is al- 
tered.’’"> These statements presuppose a background of 
immutable reality, inclusive of all that can possibly be 
affirmed or denied of it whether the affirmation or denial 
is true or not—a curious assumption. If then, a given 
statement is found not to apply, it is simply misapplied 
or some qualification is wanting to complete its perfect 
adjustment. Without this presupposition of an un- 
changing reality that limits the range of possible affir- 
mation, the quotations would amount merely to the in- 
ane statement that an untruth can be made true by being 


3 Appearance and Reality, p. 188. 
4 Ibid., p. 195. 
5 Ibid., p. 368. 


190 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


sufficiently modified. As we have no evidence that Brad- 
ley’s absolute reality exists, his characterization of error 
with reference to that reality is not very illuminating. 
We may better hold that error is simply invalidated be- 
lief, a belief that fails to function and hence has no ex- 
istence except as belief. 

The causes of error are as numerous as the forms of 
carelessness in thinking, of inadequacy in observing, of 
impulsive prejudice in judging. The important fact is 
not that we give way to prejudice or form snap judg- 
ments, but that we can recognize our mistakes and find 
a way to correct them. ‘The causes of error are partly 
under our control. The ideal of truth we can definitely 
set before us as a goal to be striven for. Nothing in our 
nature as human beings is so significant as this capacity 
to lift ourselves out of error and confusion by the power 
of persistent thinking. Philosophy is the search for the 
ultimate principle of coherence as a prerequisite to the 
attainment of the far-off goal—the kingdom of truth. 


CHAPTER III 
ZESTHETIC VALUES 


“Esthetic values are such as cause us to pronounce an 
object beautiful. As here used the term beautiful in- 
cludes the sublime and the comic, though in an elaborate 
treatise, the advisability of such inclusion might well be 
questioned. What is beauty? No characteristic of real- 
ity is more elusive. For beauty is not a homogeneous 
quality of things. Whatever satisfies us, whether in the 
practical, scientific, literary, ethical, or philosophical 
realm is beautiful. Nor can we draw a line and say 
that there is one type of beauty in nature and another in 
art. Each object in nature and each creation of art has 
its own unique beauty. Moreover the sense of the beau- 
tiful varies with the individual and in the life of the in- 
dividual at successive stages of his development. Thus 
beauty has a subjective character, like taste or smell, and 
yet pertains to the object, since the object alone awakens 
the sense of beauty. This double reference complicates 
the problem. Definition is rendered difficult also by the 
fact that the zxsthetic experience stimulates to a spon- 
taneous activity of self-expression, and this self-expres- 
sion tends to become identified with the zxsthetic experi- 
ence itself. “Ihe creative activity on the part of the mind 
as it contemplates the beautiful object is one of the main 
sources of satisfaction, yet it is not exactly the esthetic 
attitude. Rather it is a sequential experience which 
makes the beautiful object much more significant to us. 

In general we may say that the esthetic satisfactions, 
contrasting with the intellectual and the practical, mani- 
fest themselves in a free play of the mind. Perhaps this 


LO 


192 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


sense of liberation from constraint is the most charac- 
teristic feature of the xsthetic attitude. “Throughout the 
whole extent of the intellectual life, the mind is engaged 
in the formulation of definite and relatively permanent 
conceptual elements. Beginning with the initial act of 
fixation whereby we get our sense objects, it builds its 
structures out of concepts and laws that are supposed to 
hold for an apparently independent world. This is 
needful for manipulating nature, and also for storing 
and communicating knowledge. Whether our interest 
is practical or theoretical, that is, whether we would con- 
trol environing conditions or merely make a record of 
what the conditions are, our attention is held by the ex- 
ternal situation. We are in a tensive attitude. The 
bent of the mind is so dominantly practical that the atti- 
tude of constraint seems native. But when one stands 
before a beautiful object, this tension or constraint be- 
comes perceptibly less and may cease altogether. The 
esthetic attitude follows upon a sense of satisfaction. In 
the presence of that which brings release from desire we 
no longer strive. We do not feel for the moment the 
need of prescribed thought themes, nor do we care to 
bend nature to our will. Hence the forced fixities of 
articulate experience give way to a spontaneous activity 
in which distinctions tend to fade out and the mind en- 
joys itself in free creativity. Memory and fantasy con- 
tribute their treasures to heighten the experience. Aés- 
thetic appreciation thus becomes a characteristic expres- 
sion of the inner life. “The self revels in its own crea- 
tions. It is this unique joyousness of free activity that 
the poet Schiller evidently had in mind when he iden- 
tified beauty with the object of the play impulse.t This 
also inspired the philosopher Kant to affirm that the es- 
sence of beauty in an object is its capacity to stimulate 
the powers of the mind to harmonious activity.2. The 
fluidity and freedom in the esthetic experience explain 


1 Ueber die esthetische Erziehung des Menschen, 27 Brief. 
2 Kritth of Judgment, part i. § 9, p. 65. 


AESTHETIC VALUES 193 


nearly all the characterizations of beauty that have 
gained favor among thinkers, and show their underlying 
identity. 

Goethe somewhere says that “beauty is inexplicable; 
it is a hovering, floating, glittering shadow, whose out- 
line eludes the grasp of definition.’’ It is so because in 
the zsthetic attitude, the mind does not hold itself down 
to anything that remains self-identical long enough to 
be defined. Under the spell of beauty, all minds respond 
more or less. Some are dull and sluggish, some highly 
sensitive and resourceful, some have little spontaneity, 
some have much; yet none are wholly indifferent. But 
the responses to the xsthetic appeal show great variation. 

Schiller’s identification of esthetic satisfaction with 
play is instructive. “[he two are not quite the same, yet 
they have much in common. Both are of absorbing in- 
terest, both bring pleasure. But play has a goal to at- 
tain, while xsthetic appreciation ends in itself. Perhaps 
Carritt is right when he says that Schiller used the term 
play in a specific sense ‘‘as an impulse whose only object 
is beauty . . . . Little more is gained by such a use of the 
word ‘play’ than the distinction of beauty from truth and 
morality.’’* 

Benedetto Croce maintains that beauty is expression.* 
He makes it consist not in the physical or outer embodi- 
ment, but in the inner vision, the imaginative creation of 
the artist. That an artist should produce his vision in 
color or should sing his song or play his symphony is a 
mere accident and not essential to the beauty itself. Since, 

according to Croce, all expression is beautiful, there can 
be no degrees of beauty. On all these points of his theory 
he has been confronted by the critics. “They have recog- 
nized that in calling beauty expression, Croce has touched 
the essential character of all self-activity but has not dis- 
tinguished beauty from its opposite. All activity in ex- 
perience is expression, yet not all is beautiful. Croce re- 


3’ Theory of Beauty, p. 15. 
4 Aesthetic, trans, by Ainslie, 2d edition, part i. chaps, 1., ix., x. 


4 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


plies that the ugly is just that which inhibits full expres- 
sion. ‘‘Faulty expression is no expression.’ Nevertheless 
this reply does not do away with the distinction between 
the expression that satisfies and the one that does not 
(‘faulty’). The critics contend further that expression 
is complete only as bodied forth in tone or color or marble 
or verse, and in some way given definite form. This 
would seem to harmonize with ordinary views of zsthetic 
experience. The point is not vital. We need only recall 
the distinction already made between the experience world 
as it exists in the concrete for the individual and the same 
world as prepared for social exploitation. The one is pri- 
vate, the other communicable. So the individual artist 
may enjoy his own fantasies. But these have a social sig- 
nificance only when expressed in terms of the common 
world. Finally the conclusion that there are no degrees 
of beauty, while following from Croce’s premises, is 
plainly at variance with actual experience. Our esthetic 
experience may vary from the keenest delight and self- 
absorption down to indifference and thence to distaste. 
Yet we may say with Croce that the esthetic experience is 
expression, provided we mean by the statement that it is 
free expression. It would be better to say that the satis- 
fying experience awakens to spontaneous creativity. Such 
creativity is in the strictest sense self-expression. 
Theodore Lipps® varies but slightly from this concep- 
tion when he says that the esthetic experience is a thrill of 
sympathetic feeling. (Einfthlung is the word he uses. 
Titchener in his Psychology uses the word “‘empathy’’ to 
express the same idea. It is to be distinguished from sym- 
pathy as being more a feeling as if from within the object 
than a feeling with it.) In expounding this view, Lang- 
feld says that in empathy ‘‘one’s own personality is merged 
and fused in that of some external thing.’’® Empathy 
prompts to imitative response, revealed often only by a 
slight tension of the muscles involved or a diffused feeling 


5 Aesthetik, 2. Aufl. Bd. i. p. 105 ff. 
6 The Aesthetic Attitude, p. 137. 


JEST RE TIGA ABUES 1D 


of muscular responsiveness. “The imitative motor impulse 
is the characteristic feature of empathy. That we have 
in this theory a large measure of truth can hardly be 
doubted. But the imitative activity is only a part of the 
effect, so blended with the actual experience as not to be 
separated except ideally. The essential fact is that the 
beautiful object satisfies and therefore sets free. “The aban- 
don that follows may express itself.in a variety of ways, 
dependent on capacity and interest. 

Miss Puffer describes the beautiful object as one that 
possesses those qualities which bring the personality into 
a state of unity and self-completeness.? The sense of 
unity in the self is the subjective side of beauty, the zs- 
thetic attitude. Whatever inspires in one the sense of 
unity and self-completeness is objectively beautiful. The 
critic might find some obscurity in this characterization. 
What is the state of unity? Is not the sense of unity 
keenest when we gather ourselves together for a difficult 
task? Does this not grow less when we relax and enjoy 
esthetic satisfaction? Miss Puffer might explain that the 
unity here meant is that which for the nonce looks no 
further for its completion. In other words, it is the self 
in possession of an experience that satisfies, and hence lib- 
erates from desire, frees from tension, stimulates to joyous 
activity. As the practical tension is released, the spontane- 
ous activities start up. [hus the representative characteri- 
zations of beauty, subjectively considered, all imply a dis- 
tinctive development in the mental life consequent upon 
the sense of liberation felt in the presence of the object 
that satisfies. 

Certain other features of the zxsthetic experience are 
very generally recognized. Of these the two most im- 
portant are the disinterested character of the experience 
and the objective character of beauty. (By the latter is 
meant that what is beautiful for one person should be 
beautiful for others of like training and culture.) AEs- 
thetic appreciation is disinterested. “Io be able to enjoy 

7 The Psychology of Beauty, p. 49. 


196 THE AWORLD VAS VALUE 


a beautiful object without wanting to own it is to tran- 
scend the purely practical point of view and enter into 
the realm of beauty.* Perhaps the disinterestedness arises 
from the fact that zsthetic appreciation is possession in 
the deepest sense and needs no supplementation. The 
beautiful object pleases by its mere presence, in and for it- 
self; its benign influence permeates one’s nature; it is en- 
joyed to the full in mere contemplation. 


That the esthetic experience is rooted in the objective 
world can hardly be denied, despite the extreme variety of 
experiences that the same object may evoke in different 
people. But is beauty itself objective? Yes, we must 
answer. It is as objective as sound or color or substan- 
tiality. It is subjective, too, in being so changeable and 
various. ‘There is no disputing about taste, as the prov- 
erb runs. Each person in judging exsthetically knows that 
he is right, each enjoys the picture or the poem or the song 
for himself; others may think what they please. Yet 
there is a tendency to adjust our likes and dislikes so as 
to make them harmonize with the judgment of those who 
are known to have more highly developed taste. “That 
beauty is subjective in this sense in no way compromises 
its objective character. It is objective in its changeability 
and individuality, just as every experience is. Further- 
more it adheres to some object, whether in the physical 
world or in the realm of the imagination. ‘The presence 
of the object is necessary to the experience. A change of 
objects brings a change of experience. Each embodiment 
of beauty produces a unique, strictly incommensurable 
pleasure. Moreover an object adjudged beautiful is 
thought to have that quality for others besides the one 
judging. In the case of beauty as in the case of any other 
experience, to reach the common-to-all, there must be ad- 
justment and a certain amount of substitution, since every 
experience of whatever sort is unique. Finally we can 


8 For criticism of this contention, see G. Santayana, The Sense of 
Beauty, p. 37 ff. 


/ESTHETIC VALUES 197 


see, even in Croce’s idea of beauty as expression, a reason 
for making it objective. From the point of view reached 
in Part II we can have no difficulty in agreeing with both 
conceptions, so far as they are positive. Beauty is subjec- 
tive as an experience and objective as an expression. It 
originates in the esthetic attitude and depends on a specific 
adjustment of the self to the object.® 

What in the object justifies our calling it beautiful? 
What gives it the power to satisfy the mind in the mere 
contemplation of it, to free the inner life for the time from 
the control of practical interests and stimulate to happy 
thoughts? The answer must be somewhat general and 
vague. The elusiveness of beauty as a characteristic of 
objects has been dwelt upon by many students, and is evi- 
denced by the many attempts to define it. Palmer voices 
a common experience when he writes, ‘Almost everybody 
who has tried to track the shy thing has been obliged to 
acknowledge that it finally takes covert in mystery.’’!° 
But we can be sure of one characteristic, for every critic 
makes much of it. To be beautiful an object must be 
symmetrical, must express a unity that contains no ob- 
trusive or inharmonious parts. “These terms—symmetry, 
harmony, unity—are teleological; they have a meaning 
only with reference to an ideal in the mind. Perhaps the 
same thought might be better expressed by saying that an 
object is adjudged beautiful if it fulfils its nature, expresses 
itself fully and without fault. This statement, like the 
other, implies a standard of judgment. What is the na- 
ture of a thing? What constitutes an obtrusive develop- 
ment? Questions of this sort can be multiplied, and each 
must be answered differently for each individual object. 
In the exercise of taste, therefore, there is wide room for 
differences of opinion depending on the range and charac- 
ter of our education, aptitudes, interests. The force of 
social approval tends to reduce these differences of zsthetic 
judgment. But whatever the variations of taste, the object 


9Cf. Langfeld, The Aesthetic Attitude, chap. iii. 
10 G. H. Palmer, The Field of Ethics, p. 94. 


198 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


must present to the mind such a unity as satisfies and leaves 
no desire to emend. 


Artistic beauty is the embodiment of an artist’s ideal, 
and expresses an emotional attitude toward a depicted sit- 
uation. In this embodiment there must be a completeness 
of finish that excludes the suggestion of partial failure. 
Besides this evidence of skill and competency in the reali- 
zation, the work must possess what has been called sin- 
cerity or xsthetic truth. “These expressions are meant to 
exclude unbecoming triviality and such artificiality as of- 
fends good taste. Whatever degrades or minimizes the 
worth of the distinctively human, sins against zxsthetic 
truth. Aésthetic values express so completely the inner 
life of the spirit that they become self-stultifying when 
they compromise human nature; but esthetic truth is pre- 
served by whatever expresses or suggests some essential 
aspect of the emotional life. “This requirement can be met 
in depicting even the fantastic and grotesque. Further- 
more beauty is so joined with life that it can hardly be 
said to exist in what yields no suggestion of the vital and 
organic. 

In trying to summarize the wisdom of the critics as re- 
gards the conditions of xsthetic satisfaction, we can hardly 
do better than to follow the lead of Volkelt in his great 
work on 4sthettk. He gathers into four brief statements 
what seem to him the fundamental norms of esthetic 
taste. In the formulation of these norms he has recog- 
nized both the subjective or psychological and the objec- 
tive points of view. As given below these statements are 
paraphrases rather than translations of the German 
Normen." 

1. To be esthetically satisfying a work of art should 
be emotionally picturesque, and should express harmony 
of form with content. 


An object is emotionally picturesque when it lifts the 
percipient above the fragmentary, flat, and commonplace 


11 System der Aesthetik, vol. i., pp. 392-585. 


JES THETIC VALUES 199 


into the ideal world of the novel, quickening, liberating 
emotions. ‘That the perception should be pure emotion 
is the goal never actually reached. It is approached in 
music and in poetry as recited. For a poem esthetically 
satisfying, the poet must select words charged with emo- 
tional content, not the coin of ordinary commonplace in- 
terchange. Words wear smooth and wear out. ‘The re- 
quirement of emotional picturesqueness would be violated 
by a painter, for instance, who should set forth on his 
canvas, even with great skill, a group of figures or a situa- 
tion that left the beholder indifferent. A novelist might 
show great ability in portraying an utterly commonplace 
character and fail to arouse a sympathetic interest in the 
reader. His creation would be esthetically faulty. In 
like manner a dull emotionless work in music or any 
other art is rated low in esthetic quality. 

The objective counterpart of emotional picturesqueness 
is harmony of form and content. “The form includes all 
surface features. In painting or sculpture, for instance, it 
would include not only spatial aspects but materials, colors, 
light and shade—whatever serves as a medium of expres- 
sion, ‘Ihe content refers to the meaning or significance 
of the production. [The norm requires a harmony be- 
tween these two aspects. “The harmony of form and con- 
tent corresponds to the blending of vision and emotion. 
No meaning should be unembodied. The esthetic object 
is through and through a form embodying a content. The 
form full of meaning and the meaning entirely expressed 
—this is the ideal. 

Every medium has its own range of expressiveness. 
The artist who would try to make one medium express 
what is appropriate only for another medium would be 
guilty of xsthetic impropriety. His work would suffer 
from want of unity between form and content. For in- 
stance, the attempt to depict a very complex situation 
through the medium of marble is almost sure to fail. His- 
torical paintings are apt to be weak in esthetic quality for 
the same reason. In like manner “‘program music’’ has 


200 THEAWORED TASaVABUE 


been sharply criticized as violating the law of unity, since 
music is supposed not to have any power in itself to ex- 
press definite situations in time or space. ‘This does not 
mean, however, that music may not start a train of emo- 
tionally picturesque experiences that in themselves are defi- 
nite, but only that the emotions may have a varied back- 
sround of experiences. Purely ezxsthetic enjoyment is 
diminished when a description of meaning must be fur- 
nished with the music. 

The norm would condemn whatever seems isolated and 
without human significance. Deformities in man are not 
proper subjects for esthetic treatment. “The norm excludes 
also the tedious and flat. Yet the requirement of unity 
does not predetermine the limits of any medium of ex- 
pression. It is for the artist who ventures into the field 
of program music or the commonplace in poetry or the 
historical in painting to demonstrate his success in making 
his work humanly significant. The development of art 
has been marked by achievements in defiance of established 
rules. In music, the introduction of discords and complex 
harmonies, in drama, the ignoring of the ancient Greek 
requirement for unity of time and place, in poetry, the 
exaltation of the lowly and common, and in the field of 
the novel, ventures into realism, illustrate how the scope 
cf the arts has been vastly extended by transcending gen- 
erally accepted norms. 

But this twofold principle of emotional picturesqueness 
and harmony of form with content permits of an exhaust- 
less range of productivity. In a sense the principle applies 
beyond the good ethically considered; for an art produc- 
tion may represent the working of fate, the spontaneous 
ebullition of joy or sorrow, the presence of fear, astonish- 
ment, in fact, the naive in all its forms. Only that which 
for us is empty, unintelligible, bizarre, or deformed is ex- 
cluded. 

2. Ihe work should enlarge our emotional life and 
show a plenitude of human significance. 

This norm is almost identical with the first, but carries 


73S THETIC UV ALUES 201 


us a step further. The extension of the emotional vision 
results from seeing the typical in the individual and unique. 
Such apprehension is not exactly the same as conceptualiz- 
ing in the field of intellectual cognition, though the anal- 
ogy is close. In the zxsthetic experience the typical is felt 
rather than defined. We reach the typical in what is 
deepest and most essential in our emotional life. The 
more successfully a work of art can appeal to the elemental 
emotions, the greater its xsthetic worth. Such creations 
in literature, for instance, as Hamlet and Faust, unique 
as individuals yet highly typical, permanently enrich our 
lives. 

This norm, objectively considered, limits the preceding 
norm not only by excluding the trivial, worthless, foolish, 
erratic, but by insisting that the content shall be essen- 
tially significant. It takes issue with both the formalists 
and the naturalists. [he first emphasize technique at the 
expense of content; the second hold that everything 
merely because existent has artistic worth. But beauty 
inheres only in what interests man. To be esthetically 
satisf ying a work of art must speak to us of the character- 
istically human. Beauty pertains to the teleological aspect 
of nature, not to the merely mechanical. When we view 
life zsthetically, we find the self coming to the fore, and 
we see its worth and destiny as of paramount significance. 
This vitally connects the xsthetic with the moral. In 
fact, it brings all the great values—the cognitive, zxsthetic, 
moral, religious—into closest connection. All that is be- 
low the human plane takes an xsthetic worth as symbolic 
of the human. And all that is superhuman must be rep- 
resented as being essentially human in emotional life, 
however much it may transcend the human in power and 
cognition. 

3, The work should loosen the hold of reality and in- 
duct us into an ideal world of the tmagination. 

Into this norm are gathered such partial truths as that 
tthe world of beauty is one of illusion, of play, of con- 
tentless form, of disinterested contemplation. The sense 


202 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


of reality is developed in the presence of resistance to our 
wills. . The seeking for material gain or knowledge or 
moral worth is a seeking for the sense of reality. The xs- 
thetic attitude, not being an attitude of work or of plan- 
ning or of research, apprehends reality with less intensity 
and less sharpness of outline. It creates a new type of 
reality, weaker, less lasting, less obtrusive. In the pres- 
ence of this less substantial reality, the commonplace, care- 
producing interests fall away, and in their stead comes a 
feeling of restfulness, relaxation, and freedom. “The “‘dry 
and driving’ practical man of the world finds it difficult 
to let go of the prosaic reality in its ordinary aspects. He 
is literally bound. Whatever might free him to enter into 
the world where beauty makes its alluring appeal and 
brings its rest and peace would be of supreme value to him. 
The artist finds beauty everywhere. He re-groups objects, 
gives them a new setting, adorns them with what only 
the inner eye can see. With the weakening of reality a 
qualitative change comes into our world. The emotional 
accompaniments of the esthetic attitude are not the same 
as the emotions of real life. Love, longing, sorrow are 
so transformed as rightly to be called make-believe emo- 
tions. Yet they are none the less strong and genuine. 
The world of beauty is an ideal world, the work of crea- 
tive imagination. As detached from the world of struggle, 
disappointment, anxiety, it becomes a world of conscious 
illusion, or of play reality. As soon as the mind lets go 
its hold upon the practical concerns of life, where the me- 
chanical holds sway, it builds its world of beauty. This 
attitude is not rare, it is not one that requires conscious 
preparation, nor does it involve any special effort. The 
mind can enjoy itself amidst objects of beauty, whenever 
it can even for a moment drop its interest in practical 
affairs. 

4. A work of art should stimulate mental synthesis, 
and should set forth the object as an organic unity. 

The esthetically satisfying stimulates to mental syn- 
thesis, or rather it frees the mind for a spontaneous activ- 


AAS THE TIGI VALUBS 203 


ity of integration. This activity begins as soon as one 
realizes that further analysis is not of practical value. We 
break up a whole of experience in the interest of knowl- 
edge. We divide to conquer. Analysis is needed for the 
life of volition and accomplishment. With that need in 
abeyance for a time, the mind indulges itself in making 
new combinations, tracing new connections, building new 
unities. We view a situation exsthetically only when we 
view it as a whole. Emerson, the poet-philosopher, ex- 
pressed this thought in a concrete way when he said: 
“The charming landscape which I saw this morning is 
indubitably made up of some twenty or thirty farms. 
Miller owns this field, Locke that, and Manning the wood- 
land beyond. But none of them owns the landscape. 
There is a property in the horizon which no man has but 
he whose eye can integrate all the parts, that is, the poet.’’” 
Fortunately we are all poets in some measure. 

Detailed study involving careful analysis is often nec- 
essary to bring out the complex and half-hidden elements 
of beauty; but this work is preliminary, and means noth- 
ing xsthetically until the attitude, not of research, but of 
appreciation is attained. “Then the details of a complex 
situation are melted together by an emotional synthesis 
into a living whole. Now wholeness always implies pur- 
pose in some form, and purpose is practical. Yet the xs- 
thetic attitude contrasts with the practical. “This seeming 
conflict of ideas can easily be adjusted. The term prac- 
tical may refer to practice, and then it involves desire for 
change, or it may mean, pertaining to value. Only in 
the second sense is the xsthetic attitude practical. 

The universality of the esthetic sense points to an es- 
sential human need for free play of the creative imagina- 
tion. [he mind constructs for its own pleasure. The 
only occasion it needs is the sight of a beautiful object, a 
work of art, or a bit of nature that satisfies. This arrests 
its attention and holds it fast with the greater ease, be- 


12 Complete Works, Centenary edition, vol. i. p. 8. 


204 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


cause the mind feels most at home in the presence of 
beauty. Esthetic pleasure makes the mind frolicsome. 

To be ezsthetically satisfying the object must manifest 
an organic structure—unity in variety and variety in 
unity. The ideal is the completest unity encompassing 
the greatest variety. Without manifest unity the work 
would tend to distraction. Without variety the work 
would soon become monotonous. A novel so simple in 
plot as to give the mind little of synthetic work to do 
illustrates one fault, and a long novel too intricate in plot 
to be comprehended in a general view illustrates the other. 
In bringing out the sense of organic unity, much depends 
on the grouping of events or situations. “The parts must 
be so instinct with a vital principle of connection as to 
suggest life. The superfluous, the incongruous, the 
loosely attached, the discordant, the meaningless, detract 
from this suggestion of organic unity, and spoil the zs- 
thetic effect. “They suggest weakness, if not something 
worse. 

We may say then, in general, that beauty resides in the 
object and is of subjective origin; that it is a something 
in the object which by its symmetry, proportion, and 
meaningful character expresses to the mind an ideal of 
completeness; that in thus satisfying, it relieves the mind 
of volitional tension and sets it free to enjoy its own crea- 
tions of memory and fantasy. The zsthetic attitude is 
elemental in its simplicity, yet it may involve all the com- 
plexity apprehensible by the human mind. 

Certain questions that arise out of the foregoing dis- 
cussion concerning the nature of beauty deserve a passing 
notice. Is there a hierarchy of beauty? Can there be 
found anywhere or conceived as an ideal a beauty so evi- 
dently supreme and dominant that all other manifesta- 
tions of beauty must be ranged under it? Croce and 
others answer in the negative. Beauty for them is the 
same in essence wherever found, and it has no degrees of 
intensity or quality, since all expression is perfect expres- 
sion. But their conclusion does not seem to harmonize 


feos THE ICIVALUES 205 


with the facts of experience. Beauty as expression may 
vary in adequacy and finish, just as that which is ex- 
pressed, the meaning, may be much or little. Richness or 
amplitude of meaning, that is, the amount of pleasure and 
inspiration that a beautiful piece of art can induce, depends 
upon many factors none of which are constant. Some 
beautiful objects satisfy more than others. The ideal of 
perfect beauty that satisfies altogether, always, and in su- 
preme measure would doubtless be found in the realm of 
selfhood. It would have to be the ideal personality. But 
could such an ideal be used as a principle for organizing 
esthetic values into a comprehensive system? This would 
hardly be possible, though the difficulties would be prac- 
tical rather than theoretical. “The data are available, but 
are too complex and subtle for exact scientific treatment. 
While there is a sameness of essence in accordance with 
which we call an object beautiful whether it be a vase or 
a melody or a lyric or a painting or a cloud effect or a 
mountain scene or a human face, yet each object is beau- 
tiful in its own unique way. No one form can take the 
place of another. There is a strict individuality in beauty 
that not only differentiates it from all other forms of 
value, but differentiates each expression of beauty from 
every other. 

Moreover each medium of expression has its own range 
of possibilities, its own laws and limitations. A person 
may have a preference for one of these media rather than 
another; but his preference is not based on any law of 
human nature, it is dependent on aptitude or some other 
adventitious condition. “The worker in marble finds his 
world of beauty exhaustless so long as he obeys the laws 
of his medium. Likewise the poet is satisfied with his 
field of creative activity, and the musician with his. Of 
all media of emotional expression music has seemed to 
many estheticians the best adapted to the creation of 
beauty. The reason given is that in music there is so little 
of the purely physical and tangible, so much of the ether- 
eal and spiritual. Music seems to be pure stimulus, pure 


206 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


incitement, pure inspiration. While the musician might 
accept this statement, it would hardly satisfy the poet or 
the master of the brush. All can agree, however, that 
those forms of beauty are the highest which express most 
richly the aspirations of the self in its moments of fullest 
life. But this statement is too vague to be used as a basis 
of classification. 

A question suggested at the beginning of our discussion 
of xsthetic values but passed over at the time concerns the 
reason for treating the sublime and the comic as forms of 
beauty. As for the sublime, one might ask, is it not dis- 
tinctive? Does it not characteristically overawe, enthrall, 
and check the free activity of the self? And does it not 
really have a depressing effect that may be far from pleas- 
ant? Does it not contrast with the beautiful in many 
ways? Really the main difference is one of intensity. 
The sublime may be tremendously impressive, but if it 
actually overpowers and terrifies it does not manifest its 
sublimity until the self recovers sufficiently to appreciate 
the vastness before it. “The sublime awakens in the self 
unwonted activity, heightened to an almost painful inten- 
sity. “This means inner liberation, self-assertion, a deep 
joy in living. When once the mind gets possession of 
itself in the presence of the sublime, its inspirations differ 
only in degree from the joyousness felt in the presence of 
beauty. 

The comic is in sharp contrast. It pleases by its incon- 
gruities, its quick transitions, its surprises. Can the gro- 
tesquely comical be beautiful? Can a situation which 
calls forth mirth by its very awkwardness have the qual- 
ity of beauty? In so far as it pleases and sets the mind 
free for creative activity it must be adjudged beautiful. 
From this point of view the comic may have beauty in a 
high degree. But its quality is dependent on the subtle 
influence of the normal, working by way of contrast. The 
experience of the comical is, therefore, apparently more 
complex than of other forms of beauty. 

Finally, what is the relation of zsthetic to moral values? 


ESTHETIC VALUES 207 


This might better be discussed after we have considered 
moral values in detail, yet something can be said at this 
point if only by way of transition. Aésthetic values like 
all others are values for a self. They differ in quality ac- 
cording as they promote self-development. Each makes 
its own characteristic contribution, but some are more ef- 
fective than others. Just as they all must be known to be 
appreciated and thus become cognitive values, so they must 
vary in desirability and hence furnish the basis for moral 
values. In so far as any values whatever please and sat- 
isfy without the need of what lies beyond them, they call 
forth the esthetic attitude and reveal the elusive quality 
we call beauty. The connection, then, between moral and 
zsthetic values is necessarily very close. As beauty can be 
shared without loss, even be enhanced by sharing, it be- 
longs to the higher values of life. Its appreciation is an 
unalloyed pleasure, unmixed with any elements detrimen- 
tal to the interests of the self. Hence its cultivation is 
one of man’s permanent duties, and hence it has direct 
moral significance. Such appreciation cannot take the 
place of active volitional effort, but that is not to its dis- 
credit. It helps to refine and elevate the emotions, render 
us more sensitive to spiritual values of all kinds, call out 
the affections, and sweeten all of life. When we come to 
study the self in its relation to the manifold spheres of 
value, we may find reason to see still more in esthetic 
values than is here indicated.%* 


13 Cf, Palmer, The Field of Ethics, p. 90 ff. 


CHAPTER IV 
MORAL VALUES 


The moral life begins with the first act of choice. How 
early in the life of an individual this first choice takes 
place no one can tell. Presumably we begin to choose 
when we begin to live. In so far as this is true we are 
moral in being human. But large allowance must be made 
for immaturity and changing insight, not to mention self- 
control. Just as a child at first is scarcely more than a 
bundle of wants and reflex impulses, so its moral life must 
begin in what is essentially sub-moral. 

Distinctively moral values pertain primarily not to the 
objects sought after, but to the attitude of the self toward 
competing goods. This statement, rightly understood, 
seems self-evident. Yet it can easily be misconstrued into 
meaning that morality has to do only with intentions, 
let the consequences be what they may. Such an interpre- 
tation is absurd and mischievous. ‘The attempt to sepa- 
rate the moral intention from the consequences of an act 
must be as futile as the attempt to sever the connections of 
the two poles in a magnet. “They get their whole signifi- 
cance from each other. A genuinely moral attitude pre- 
supposes not only a will to make the right choice, but a 
knowledge of what is involved therein and a will strong 
enough to realize the choice. If the requisite knowledge is 
lacking the attitude is defective; and if the will is weak 
in execution, good intentions will not save it from moral 
condemnation. 

Because of this intimately personal character of moral 
value, students of ethics who would confine themselves 
exclusively to the objective point of view unduly limit the 


208 


MORAL VALUES 209 


field. They do well in striving to make ethics as far as 
possible a positive science of values. By studying concrete 
situations they are able to discover the rules of conduct 
most conducive to human welfare. “This task is of prime 
importance and is in line with the scientific treatment of 
other great human interests. But such a treatment pre- 
supposes a basis of general theory that needs critical ex- 
amination. If revision is neglected, the underlying theo- 
ries are almost sure to harbor crude and conflicting ideas. 
For instance, detailed objective study must assume a work- 
ing conception of man, his main interests and his destiny. 
An inadequate conception of man’s nature is certain to 
distort one’s estimate of values and may lead to tragic re- 
sults. The world war from which we are still slowly 
recovering is a case in point. 

Fortunately the objective treatment of the moral life 
tends to correct itself. “To the reflective student it quickly 
reveals its inadequacy. Questions arise as to why certain 
clamant interests rather than certain others should be 
satisfied. Why should economic prosperity be such an 
absorbing objective? Why should society be so exercised 
over matters of dress and social prestige? What makes 
life worth living? Such questions, in time, become insist- 
ent. “They compel one to turn aside from the pursuit of 
the objective sources of value, to consider the self as the 
evaluator for whom alone the values exist. One needs to 
take account not only of man’s impulsive nature, his ap- 
petencies and interests, but of his possible future as a de- 
veloping intelligence. Values change in relative impor- 
tance as one’s conception of destiny changes. Especially 
does one need to appreciate the significance of man’s power 
of intelligent choice. “This may seem to have no direct 
bearing on the problem of moral values. But, in fact, it 
carries the heart of the moral issue. We are moral be- 
cause we can assume a right or wrong attitude toward the 
goods of life, can suspend or reverse a decision. 

Those whose scientific interests hold them persistently 
to the objective treatment of moral values discount the 


210 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


subjective element of choice and intent. In a moment of 
depression when the problem of objective right and wrong 
weighed heavily upon him, Huxley declared, “‘I protest 
that if some great Power would agree to make me always 
think what is true and do what is right, on condition of 
being turned into a sort of clock and wound up every 
morning before I got out of bed, I should instantly close 
with the offer.’ This can hardly be taken as his delib- 
erate judgment. It would mean the loss of all that gives 
zest and significance to life—the eager uncertainty of seek- 
ing, the exultation of achievement, the growing conscious- 
ness of mastery in overcoming, the enrichment of person- 
ality through struggle, the approbation of those whose 
approval we most desire. Values would become insipid, 
and their insipidity would have to be taken as the upper 
limit of emotional satisfaction. Fortunately to choose 
among goods is not only our prerogative, but a compul- 
sion from which there is no escape short of imbecility. 
Since every situation presents competing goods and 
these may differ widely in their desirability, the central 
problem of ethics is to find a principle of organization 
which can serve as a guide in making our choices. Where- 
as xsthetic values are too individual and unique to yield 
to classification and system building, moral values are by 
their nature relative, and exist only by virtue of some or- 
ganization. Until there is a basis of judgment concerning 
relative desirability among values, the moral personality 
remains bewildered and distraught. But to bring order 
into the world of values is extremely difficult. Attempt- 
ing it we are confronted by all the complexity of the ob- 
jective world where the values are found, and also by the 
unfolding complexity of human life where the values are 
appraised. We project our wills into this world of 
change, and deflect however slightly the course of events. 
The result may or may not be immediately satisfying to 
us; We may or may not secure the good we intended. But 
the immediate effects are only the beginnings; what of 


1 Methods and Results, p. 192 f. 


MORAL VALUES 211 


the distant consequences in the outside world and in our- 
selves? Our grasp of any situation is limited to a few of 
the nearer and more obvious aspects; where can we get 
the larger insight that we as moral beings must have? 
Who can tell how to organize our vast heritage of values? 
This is the ethical problem of the ages. The quest is for 
the highest good—the principle of organization—as a 
standard for determining what for us as human beings is 
of most worth. 

The meager success attending past efforts and the con- 
tinuous recurrence of the same problems have disheartened 
not a few students and turned their thought to the field 
of empirical generalizations, the discovery of the laws of 
choice which change with social, economic and cultural 
conditions. Can we ever get such a view of objective 
values and such an insight into the deeper recesses of the 
developing self as to see the whole dominated by a uni- 
tary principle? As each period in the life of the self has 
its own preferential values, so has each stage of culture in 
the social whole. Must we, then, conclude that there is 
no final standard of value applicable to all stages and con- 
ditions? This is a position taken by some influential 
writers of the present day. 

A. E. Taylor summarizes his view thus: “But we say, 
first, moral progress is not an ultimate fact; our moral 
gains, as we can often see in particular cases, have had to 
be paid for by losses of one kind and another; and next, 
moral progress is progress towards the realisation of an 
ideal built on compromise—an ideal that falls to pieces 
the moment it is subjected to serious and honest philo- 
sophical analysis; and therefore what appears as progress, 
when judged with special reference to one of the materially 
conflicting aspects of the ideal, may be looked upon as 
retrogression when estimated with reference to the other.’’” 
Much can be said for such a position. “The fashion of the 
day in intellectual matters favors it. We are in revolt 
against finalities of every description. Why go on a boot- 


2 The Problem of Conduct, p. 302. 


Pate THE WORLD AS VALUE 


less search for what is really transcendental when there are 
urgent practical issues close at hand?* ‘This argument has 
the ring of moral earnestness and common sense. It calls 
us back to the daily situations that we must confront. 
It is moral realism of an appealing sort. But it is also 
moral scepticism, insidious and all-pervading. It affects 
deleteriously every major interest of life, lowering the 
moral tone, weakening aspiration, and undermining con- 
fidence in one’s self. The abandonment of the quest for 
the highest good is simply intolerable to any one who 
sees what it means. Many failures do not justify a final 
scepticism of man’s ability to reach the coveted insight; 
for nothing less than the unity and destiny of the self is 
involved. Let negative criticism be as keen and destruc- 
tive as it may, it can only establish more securely the solu- 
tion that survives. This intellectual urge from the depths 
of selfhood is itself suggestive of what the highest good 
must be. 

The advantageous method of approach will be to con- 
sider the general characteristics that the highest good must 
possess, and then look about within the compass of our 
moral horizon for what may meet the requirements. In- 
cidentally this will enable us to pass in review the typical 
solutions of our problem and to meet the criticism of Tay- 
lor and others. 

Evidently a good to be supreme and of unconditional 
value, capable of dominating all other goods and furnish- 
ing the law of their organization, must itself be supremely 
inclusive. It must be capable of taking over into itself 
whatever the experience of mankind pronounces good. 
In short, it cannot be a good set over against other goods, 
a good to be chosen instead of them. To this extent 
Leslie Stephen was right when he said: ‘The dread of 
hunger, thirst, and cold; the desire to gratify the pas- 
sions; the love of wife and child or friend; sympathy 


8 Cf. Leslie Stephen, The Science of Ethics, p. 461; also Taylor, 
OF cilia sth io ee 


MORAL VALUES BAYS 


with the sufferings of our neighbours; resentment of in- 
jury inflicted upon ourselves—these and such as these are . 
the great forces which govern mankind. When a moral- 
ist tries to assign anything else as an ultimate motive, he 
is getting beyond the world of realities.”’* The reason 
for this requirement of inclusiveness is plain; such a good 
as might come into competition with others would be 
subject to the vicissitudes of our changing emotional life. 
It might at any time be set aside without manifest moral 
absurdity in favor of a rival good; for the issue would be 
simply, which makes the greater appeal? A _ blessed- 
ness that palls is ready to be superseded. 

Again this supreme good must be capable of internal 
development, so as to adapt itself to the capacities of the 
developing self. This requirement is almost identical 
with the preceding, since to be all-inclusive, the good 
must have perfect adaptability to differing ages and de- 
grees of culture, as well as to all the fluctuations of indi- 
vidual sentiment. But to mention this requirement sep- 
arately is to give added emphasis to the principle of growth 
which must be embodied. Yet how can such a good, be- 
ing so various, have any unity? How can it exist as the 
supreme yood when it must identify itself with every 
other good of life? What can save it from utter vague- 
ness? 

These questions bring into relief a third requirement as 
important as either of the others. The summum bonum 
must be sufficiently definite to serve as the principle of 
organization for the whole world of values. “This require- 
ment would appear to be the most difficult one to satisfy. 
As an organizing principle the highest good must not only 
be definite, but must maintain its identity. Otherwise 
confusion would result. One need not wonder that the 
quest for such a good should seem so nearly hopeless. “The 
three requirements—inclusiveness, adaptability, definiteness 
—are to all appearances incompatible. One thing is sure, 
they decisively rule out all objective goods, that is, goods 


4 The Science of Ethics, p. 461. 


Mes THE WORLD AS VALUE 


identified with the objects of the external world. These 
are definite but exclusive. “They may have some adapta- 
bility, yet not enough to prevent their being outgrown. 
They depend for their value on the changing tastes and 
attitudes of people. 

But if the highest good is not anything we can acquire 
from without—not wealth or position or power—where 
can we look for it? Religiously minded people might say, 
“To do God’s will is our highest good’’-—""To glorify God 
and enjoy him forever,’’ as the Westminster Catechism 
has it. “This comes near to meeting the conditions. It is 
all-inclusive, or should be. It should be—and that is 
the difficulty. What is God’s will? Every creed has -its 
answer, and every individual who subscribes to a given 
creed interprets it in his own way. Each one’s interpre- 
tation can be justified only by appeal either to external 
authority or to experience. External authority has no 
place in this discussion, for it is simply a foreclosure pro- 
ceeding. If we are to think our problems through, we 
must not be cut short by a dictum, however sacred the 
authority. In facing the issue we can recognize no author- 
ity except that of insight. If we hold that God’s will is 
our highest good and yet appeal to experience to learn 
what that will is, experience itself appears as our real 
authority and God’s will as an afterthought. 

A further difficulty arises when we consider the future. 
How can we adjust the theory to growing insight? We 
must either acknowledge that what we had thought God’s 
will was not actually his permanent will, or that the new 
insight, if incompatible, is a false and pernicious belief. 
In either case we encounter embarrassment. The possi- 
bility of our being mistaken as to the content of God’s 
will must either turn us back to experience for support or 
make us into obscurantists, intent on blindly establishing 
an outgrown creed. [he ‘‘will of God’’ is but a name 
for the highest good. ‘The sanctity in the name tends 
to fixate the content. As a people’s moral life develops, 


MORAL VALUES aM Ms 


this content may come to seem immoral. History fur- 
nishes many illustrations. 

If, however, we introduce the principle of growth, we 
might look upon God’s will as always right, but as 
progressively revealed to man according to man’s ability 
to understand. This would allow for a good deal of 
suess work, of trial and error, of misunderstanding and 
revision. Thus God’s will would become practically 
equivalent to the categorical command of conscience to 
seek the highest good when we know what that is. Once 
we find the highest good and recognize its power of 
growth, we are at liberty to identify it with the will of 
God. This identification has great value. It transforms 
duty into an expression of personal allegiance to God, 
and thus gives devotion to the right a depth of meaning 
not otherwise possible. Nevertheless only mischief is 
likely to result when the order is reversed. 

We may conclude, therefore, that in man and in man 
alone can be found the highest good. This conclusion 
seems reasonable on the face of it, since the good as such 
exists only for man. He is the judge; he alone can set 
up a standard. If, then, we turn to the self as carrying 
in its own nature the highest good, what features of the 
subjective life can satisfy the conditions? Viewing the 
history of thought on this subject, one is impressed with 
the persistence of the hedonistic conception that the high- 
est good is pleasure. 

This conception makes an immediate appeal, for pleas- 
ure is evidently a common element in all goods. Appar- ° 
ently, too, it is the only common element. Goods differ 
among themselves, but they are good because they please. 
No person in his right mind would freely choose discom- 
fort or pain as his good, unless he were persuaded that it 
had to be accepted as a means to the attainment of out- 
weighing good. With pleasure regarded as our highest 
good we might conceivably arrange the goods of life in 
accordance with such tests as relative intensity, duration, 
and quality of after effects, and thus form a hierarchy of 


216 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


goods. If such a scheme of relative desirability could be 
worked out in detail, we might apply it with comparative 
ease in every case of doubt. ‘The suggestion is near at 
hand that a calculus of values, mathematically exact, 
might be constructed, if only we could get the requisite 
data. Hedonism then must be recognized as containing 
much truth. It certainly cannot be ignored by a serious 
student of the moral life. Before it can be validated, 
however, it must be cleared of certain ambiguities. 

What is meant by the term pleasure? It may have 
the widest range of meaning. At one time it may be con- 
fined to the sensuous gratifications of the voluptuary; at 
another, it may be extended to cover the shrewdly cal- 
culated satisfactions of the cultured but selfish man of the 
world; at another, it may include the inspiration which 
comes from devotion to a great social ideal. A principle 
that may thus be broadened to include all possible satis- 
factions, or contracted till it means only present, passing, 
sensuous feelings, can be of little value as a standard. By 
a mere shift of meaning from the agreeable affective states 
in bodily functioning to the higher ranges of esthetic and 
social interests, one may make contradictory statements 
concerning pleasure. In its most restricted meaning as 
the satisfaction of the physical senses, pleasure is mani- 
festly inadequate, except for those who have once for all 
abandoned themselves to brutishness. “The low lines of 
application in this sense condemn it. 

On the other hand, when we make it cover all sorts of 
satisfactions, it becomes a blanket equivalent for good in 
general. As such it yields no special insight into the rela- 
tive desirability of goods. ‘The initial difficulty, then, 
with hedonism is that its fundamental conception is am- 
biguous. In attempting under the stress of criticism, to 
clear the doctrine of ambiguity and develop its possibili- 
ties, hedonistic thinkers, especially recent ones, have moved 
toward a somewhat contrasting conception. ‘They early 
recognized that hedonism must transcend not only the 
lower types of sensuous pleasure (Cyrenaicism), but also 


MORAL VALUES ey, 


every form of merely selfish gratification, however ex- 
tended and refined, if it was to commend itself to the 
healthy moral consciousness. “This led to its development 
into what, since the time of John Stuart Mill, has been 
called utilitarianism. In several respects this doctrine is 
an advance upon its prototype. 

Improvements were attempted in three directions. 
(1) The tests of relative desirability among pleasures 
were elaborated. (2) A qualitative distinction was intro- 
duced as a decisive test of desirability. (3) Social obli- 
gation was recognized as equally significant with individ- 
ual interest. ‘The first and last of these improvements 
were developed by Jeremy Bentham; the second, by John 
Stuart Mill. Bentham tried to show how pleasures could 
be classified according to strict scientific tests, of which 
he enumerated seven.® By applying these in any given 
case, the relative desirability of a pleasure could be deter- 
mined. Of any given pleasure as compared with other 
pleasures, we want to know the relative intensity, dura- 
tion, certainty or uncertainty, propinquity or:remoteness, 
fecundity, purity, and extent. 

Without stopping to discuss these several tests, we note 
that the last is of special significance as carrying us beyond 
mere selfish or egoistic motives. [he individual should 
will not only his own happiness, but the happiness of all. 
“The greatest happiness to the greatest number’ should 
be one’s guiding ideal. “To give definiteness to this ideal, 
Bentham laid down the principle that everybody is to 
count for one, and nobody for more than one. Asa basis 
for reform legislation, of which England at the time was 
in sore need, this exposition of hedonism was of great 
service. But as a theory of morals its inadequacy was 
soon revealed when the critics pointed out that all the 
tests might be satisfied on a very low plane of living. 

John Stuart Mill tried to save the theory by introduc- 
ing the notion of quality as a mark of distinction among 
pleasures. He said: ‘“‘It would be absurd that while, in 


5 Principles of Morals and Legislation, p. 29 f. 


218 THE’ WORLD FASOVAEUE 


estimating all other things, quality is considered as well 
as quantity, the estimation of pleasures should be sup- 
posed to depend on quantity alone. . . . It is better to 
be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied.’’"* Few 
would question this pronouncement. But a qualitative 
test seems to transcend hedonism. Dignity or worth as 
the differentia refers to the self as a whole. Nor does 
the conception of the greatest happiness to the greatest 
number follow from the hedonistic premise. Why, for 
instance, should I will the happiness of another, unless 
I am persuaded that I thereby increase my own happiness? 
How can I be sure that in this way my own happiness 
will be increased? Experience on the whole seems to be 
against such a conclusion. In uncertainty we must appeal 
not to pleasure as an agreeable feeling, but to the self and 
its nature as a social being. 

The basis of social obligation, according to utilitarians 
generally, is sympathy. But if sympathy is to meet the 
requirements, it must be thought as more than mere feel- 
ing. It must be able to justify all our moral judgments— 
justice, benevolence, honesty—-and must explain the moral 
emotions of remorse and self-approval. ‘This is a big 
contract for the emotion of sympathy, unless it is sup- 
ported by all the resources of the self. When, therefore, 
all the elements involved in the emotion are included, the 
self in its entirety stands before us. 

One of the most influential moralists of recent times, 
Henry Sidgwick, undertook to rehabilitate hedonistic util- 
itarianism by arguing (1) that qualitative distinctions 
among pleasures could be reduced to quantitative by the 
simple device of giving them a higher quantitative rating 
to correspond to a higher qualitative value;? and (2) that 
the basis of social obligation is found in native intuitions 
that give binding authority to justice, benevolence, and 
their derivatives.® 


6 Utilitarianism, chap. ii. 
7 The Methods of Ethics, bk. i. chap. vii. § 2. 
8 Ibid., bk. iii. chap. xiii. 


MORAL VALUES Jat 


On the first point one need hardly remark that quali- 
tative distinctions are not actually reduced to quantita- 
tive; they remain as unique and incommensurable as ever. 
To give them quantitative expression is a matter of con- 
venience in manipulation. Their uniqueness must be rec- 
ognized, and can be accounted for only by reference to 
the feeling of selfhood and its essential worth. ‘The sec- 
ond point raises many questions, some of which we cannot 
stop to consider. But plainly intuitions are not necessarily 
valid. No ultimate obligation can be established by ap- 
peal to them. This is so evident that it need not be 
argued. If there were no other ground for setting aside 
Sidgwick’s contention, the fact of conflicting intuitions 
would be sufficient. “The moral judgments, justice, benev- 
olence, and the like, are authoritative because they express 
the fundamental demands of selfhood. “These demands 
make such a spontaneous appeal to the developed moral 
personality that they seem to be intuitive. They are 
intuitive in the same sense that the apprehension of the 
outside world is intuitive—we are not conscious of con- 
structive mental activity in such acquisition. 

In justice to Sidgwick we must say that he did a real 
service in bringing to light certain limitations in the 
theorizings of previous utilitarians, and in showing that 
these limitations can be overcome by extending the mean- 
ing of the term pleasure till it covers all satisfactions what- 
soever. A significant statement indicates his final conclu- 
sion as to the adequacy of hedonism: ‘‘For my own part, 
when I reflect on the notion of pleasure—using the term 
in the comprehensive sense which I have adopted, to in- 
clude the most refined and subtle intellectual and emotional 
gratifications, no less than the coarser and more definite 
sensual enjoyments—the only common quality that I can 
find in the feelings so designated seems to be that relation 
to desire and volition expressed by the general term 
‘desirable,’ in the sense previously explained.’’® This 
statement is in harmony with the view just expressed, 


9 The Methods of Ethics, bk. ii. chap. ii. § 2. 


220 THE WORLD ( ASHV ALE 


that the self and its attitudes determine what is good; for 
a will attitude is an attitude of the self in willing. “The 
good then turns out to be anything that satisfies desire. 
What desires should be satisfied? Some are suppressed in 
every choice. “Thinkers belonging to a school opposed to 
hedonism reply that reason alone should determine the 
choice. 

This school has borne various names at different times 
in its history—stoicism, intuitionism, rationalism. It has 
expressed itself also in various forms according to the 
individual thinker’s estimate of what is significant in such 
questions as, Is there a moral sense? What is conscience? 
Are there moral intuitions? What is the seat of author- 
ity in morals? Are there unconditionally binding moral 
laws? Which is more fundamental, egoism or altruism? 
Yet the school is characterized in general by the doctrine 
that the highest good is life according to reason. ‘This 
school, more than others, has emphasized the intent of 
the act rather than the objective goods as of moral worth. 
‘The man of good will, even though he may under adverse 
conditions fail of his purpose, is the man whom the moral 
sense of a community approves. Without the good will, 
all other goods are of doubtful value, nothing is what 
it ought to be. “The man who consistently exemplifies 
the good will has attained the highest good. 

The good will, as the source of obligation, expresses 
itself in a law of universal application. Kant’s formula- 
tions of this law have become classic for rationalism. 
Kant’s most frequently quoted statement of it, “Act as 
if the maxim of thy action were to become by thy will 
a Universal Law of Nature,’’?° seems, on the face of it, 
purely formal. Critics have maintained that any act 
whatever can be universalized and made to meet the re- 
quirements of the law. A liar could will that all men lie, 
and a thief that all men steal if they wished. But such 
a criticism borders on the absurd, as Kant himself shows 


10 Kant, Theory of Ethics, trans. by Abbott, p, 39, cf. pp. 38, 
119, 


MORAL VALUES PAY) 


in his exposition. The maxim must be worthy to become 
a universal law. This is Kant’s evident meaning. An- 
other formulation of this ‘‘categorical imperative,’ as 
Kant calls it, brings out better the meaning he had in 
mind: ‘‘So act as to treat humanity, whether in thine 
own person or in that of any other, in every case as an 
end withal, never as means only.’’4! This brings us to 
a new point of view. ‘The good will is now represented 
as good because it wills the good of rational beings. This 
contention clears the moral atmosphere. It calls man to 
a strict accounting for his every deed. It meets every 
moral situation with a “‘Thou shalt’? or ‘““Thou shalt 
not.” The thief, the liar, the slacker, the cheat, come 
under condemnation; they treat other human beings as 
mere means to the realization of their own selfish ends. 
We can forgive Kant’s excessive zeal in emphasizing 
the goodness of such a will apart from the question of 
consequences, for he was calling attention to a vital but 
neglected factor. When we interpret him broadly—and 
his entire discussion amply justifies our doing so—we see 
that he has come close to the insight we are seeking. To 
treat humanity as of supreme worth and arrange all values 
with reference thereto is to supply the moral life with a 
basis both comprehensive and authoritative. But Kant’s 
statement seems still a little abstract. “The humanity in 
the individual may mean that which the individual is 
because of his rationality. This evidently was Kant’s 
meaning. But we are much more than merely rational, 
as Kant well knew. We need to give Kant’s thought a 
more concrete expression. In trying to do this we see 
that whatever, in utilitarianism, is excluded by the 
Kantian conception must be reinstated. “The good will 
must find itself in the world of objective goods. It can 
act only on a knowledge of relative values. Hence to meet 
all the conditions, what is needed is a conception that 
will embrace not only the good will but the principle of 
relativity among objective goods. Such a conception can 


11 Thid., p. 47. 


222 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


be none other than the conception of the self, the creator 
of values, the being for whom all values exist. It is in the 
well-being of the self and nowhere else that the subjective 
and the objective factors are united. Goods become moral 
when they are chosen in preference to some other goods. 
This choice is the subjective factor. It refers the moral 
quality not so much to the goods chosen as to the attitude 
of the one who chooses. On the other hand, the intention 
to choose the good must eventuate in a right choice, and 
this involves a knowledge of objective conditions. A 
completely moral act, then, must include knowledge of 
consequences. ‘This is the objective element. 

From our present point of view we can more accurately 
appraise hedonistic doctrines. Is it pleasure that we seek? 
Not always, nor even generally; rather it is the object that 
we seek. Pleasure accompanies both the seeking and the 
attainment of the object. But the quality of pleasure in 
every case is different, depending on a multitude of sub- 
jective conditions. Pleasure seems at first to furnish an 
adequate basis for the organization of values, just because 
it unconsciously borrows its quality from the situations 
themselves in which the good is sought. As purely sub- 
jective, it may simulate every variety of satisfaction and 
thus seem exhaustlessly resourceful. But when taken in 
this sense, it is mere feeling, and notoriously changeable. 
Being without internal structure, it is devoid of any basis 
for organization. All that makes it significant is derived 
from that which is not mere feeling, such complex states, 
for example, as relief from anxiety, the fellowship of 
friends, the interest in a good book, the satisfaction fol- 
lowing upon some achievement. ‘These are all qualita- 
tively different and incommensurable. They involve 
objective factors. 

How can the exclusive subjectivity of pleasure be cor- 
rected by an objectivity that does not exclude it? The 
answer has already been given. Only the self with its 
subjective life of emotion and its objective expression in 
world construction can accomplish this union. And the 


MORAL VALUES Zao 


self exemplifies it perfectly in every conscious experience. 
Hence whether we start with objective goods or with 
some subjective factor, we are carried forward to the idea 
of the self in its entirety as alone meeting the conditions 
of the highest good. All other conceptions emphasize 
some aspect of selfhood to the exclusion of others, and 
therefore fail. The self cannot be thus divided, nor can 
one of its phases be isolated from the rest without fatal 
results for the moral life. 

In making self-realization the goal of life and the 
unconditioned good, we face many difficulties. Some of 
these are cases of misunderstanding and some of confusion. 
But there are some also that simply reflect the complexity 
of selfhood and its indeterminate character as a growing 
entity. Perhaps the most persistent ethical difficulty is 
the feeling that self-realization as the supreme objective 
would tend to make one self-centered, morbidly intro- 
spective, and in subtle ways, selfish. Closely akin to this 
criticism is the contention that since self-perfection means 
perfection of function, and every experience, good or bad, 
contributes to the development of function, the ideal of 
self-realization fails to yield any principle of organiza- 
tion, fails to distinguish the desirable from the undesir- 
able. “These two are the most formidable difficulties that 
beset the recognition of self-realization as the highest 
good. ‘There are others of minor significance, but they 
are for the most part mere specifications within the range 
of the two major criticisms. For instance, How can we 
reconcile self-realization with the ethico-religious ideal of 
self-sacrifice and self-denial? What is the relation of this 
ideal to agreeable feeling? In taking for granted that the 
development of selfhood involves a corresponding increase 
of happiness, are we not making an unwarranted assump- 
tion of cosmic support? How can we know that an 
enhancement of self-consciousness and the development of 
a more sensitive attitude toward the hard facts of life 
will not aggravate our sense of pain, failure, and the ulti- 
mate futility of life? It would be easy to bring forward 


IN i THE (WORLD AST VARUE 


instances of spiritual depression following upon sensitive- 
ness to the adverse conditions of living. Increase of sym- 
pathy means increase of sorrow. Might we not come in 
time to the oppressive conclusion that all is “vanity and 
a striving after wind’? In view of this possibility would 
it not be the part of wisdom to turn away from the highly 
problematical ideal with its indefiniteness; its unproved 
assumption of cosmic indorsement, and give our attention 
to the objective values, known and proved? Not only 
may we know these values by direct experience, but we 
have ways of determining their relative desirability. Why 
not make sure of these values and discard the vague ideal 
of self-realization? What, after all, is the connection 
between objective goods and the ideal? May not this 
connection be such as to preclude our seeking both objec- 
tive goods and self-realization at the same time? May 
they not be in large measure mutually exclusive? 

Critics further contend that we know too little about 
the self and its possibilities to make its perfection or con- 
summation the goal of life. Better abandon altogether 
the fruitless task of defining the highest good and attend 
to the values that experience actually reveals. Sometime 
in the dim future man may know enough about himself 
and his relation to the world to make the final generaliza- 
tion that will exhibit all goods as having their place of 
relative desirability in an all-embracing system. When 
that stage is reached, the highest good will appear as just 
the world of goods thus organized. 

Our reply to these difficulties and objections contains 
three points: 

(1) The objective study of goods with a view to de- 
termining relative desirability is essential. It is the whole 
ethical problem viewed objectively. But this problem 
cannot be solved from the exclusively objective point of 
view. If we were in the midst of such an effort we should 
inevitably encounter the question, What is the ultimate 
reason for saying that one good is more desirable than 
another? ‘This would precipitate the problem of goods 


MORAL VALUES Z25 


for a self. If goods are goods because a self has the capac- 
ity to enjoy them, then an increase of selfhood must mean 
an increase of capacity to enjoy, an increase of objective 
values. From this point of view, self-realization and in- 
crease of capacity to enjoy are practically interchangeable 
terms. We regard as relatively undeveloped the self that 
has but few contacts with its environing world of values. 
Its sources of joy are few, primitive, elemental. As the 
nature of the self unfolds, its contacts multiply, it becomes 
capable of appreciating myriads of values in the realm of 
the intangible and social that are practically non-existent 
for the more rudimentary self. Its greater range and 
subtlety of appreciation mean its greater development, its 
movement toward ultimate self-realization. 

(2) No system of moral values is possible without a 
supreme principle of good, one that stands out distinct 
from all others as of unconditional worth. This has 
already been insisted upon. It is manifest that in a scheme 
of values all other goods must get their rating from the 
supreme good. Now the lesson of the centuries is that 
not only do objective goods, as objective, fail to qualify 
for the supreme good, but likewise all such subjective 
ideals as pleasure, happiness, and reason, fail. These 
ideals fall short only because they are mere phases or 
aspects of the inner life. “They severally express in part 
the activity of the self. When taken in their relation to 
one another and as inseparably bound up in the life of 
the self, they acquire a merit of a different order. It is 
the self that must say what is good and what evil. We 
must wait for its decisions to get any light on ethical 
issues. When we say, then, that a good is a good for a 
self, we must mean that the good of the self is the only 
good. 

(3) We know more about the self than we do about 
anything else in the universe. It is our sole standard of 
interpretation. When we ask what a given object is, what 
its nature is, we answer in terms of selfhood. ‘There is 
nothing else that we can do. The self is our principle 


226 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


of insight into the nature not only of other selves, but 
of all objects, even the inanimate, of which we know 
so little, because they have so little of the nature of the 
self. They can move when started by something else, 
but—if the mechanical view of nature is correct—they 
can neither stop nor change the rate or direction of mo- 
tion, once they are started. Something else must do it 
for them. There is not much of selfhood in such objects; 
yet our knowledge of their motions is derived from our 
experience of our own movements. While we may not 
know what in the far-off future the self may be capable 
of becoming, we have even now the general lineaments 
of all possible development of selfhood. The essential 
nature of spirit, that is, the self in its social expression, 
is known to us; and if spirit is the highest manifestation 
of life, we can be sure of the direction that self-realization 
must take. 

True, one may reply, we know about the self, but do 
we know the self? If we consider the variety of theories 
as to the nature of the self, there seems to be nothing in 
the range of experience so little understood. Some think 
that the self is a changeless core of being in the midst of 
mental states; others that it is a complex of such states; 
others, that it is a canalized medium through which a 
supposed ultimate power expresses itself; others, that it 
is the sense of awareness accompanying mental states; 
others, that it is nothing but an epiphenomenon—a bad 
name for it as a troublesome non-entity. But these theo- 
ries of the self need not disturb us at present. When in 
the next part we have occasion to study the nature of self- 
hood, we can gather up for critical review the typical 
conceptions. 

But the theory of self-realization ‘here advocated can- 
not countenance the practical denial of the self’s existence 
or its resolution into a mere interpenetrative succession of 
mental states. “The minimum of assumption is that the 
self has experiences, knows them as such, and is able in 
some measure to control both its own inner states and 


MORAL VALUES Sst 


its external environment. So much is the plain teaching 
of experience, and its denial is always in the interest of 
some general theory born of a scientific preoccupation 
with the mechanics of the thing world. The self to be 
realized is the self of experience, not a psychological rep- 
resentation of it. 

An experience of selfhood can have a wide range and 
can vary in depth. What self is to be realized? Here 
we need to distinguish between the idea of the self as shut 
in, centripetal, greedy, and the idea of the self as realizing 
itself in society, that is, as giving of its own resources 
and thereby enriching itself. These two conceptions are 
not mutually exclusive, they merely mark different stages 
of insight into what the self actually is. The notion of 
the self as nothing more than a value-receiving center, 
an appropriator of goods, is accepted as a matter of course 
by those who have not thought seriously about life. 
Such people conceive of the self after the analogy of 
physical things that grow by accretion, at the expense of 
other things. “Though ordinary experience, when care- 
fully considered, does not support this crude notion, it is 
all too dominant in practice. Especially is this true in 
the economic world. But the self to be realized is the 
social self that grows by giving and receives that it may 
have more to give. ‘This self alone is the concrete reality. 
Since this conception provides for unlimited growth 
toward the ideal of ultimate human possibilities, it cannot 
be transcended by any future development. In fact, race 
progress may be measured by it. Within its scope one 
may be as individualistic or as communistic as one likes; 
egoism ceases to be a moral menace, altruism may no longer 
mean the sacrifice of true self-interest.’? 

But the critic may argue that self-realization presup- 
poses that the good of society is always the good of the 
individual, and vice versa. “The theory practically main- 
tains that real self-denial is impossible, whereas one can 


12 Cf. Warner Fite’s penetrative study, Individualism, pp. 122, 
159-162. 


228 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


easily imagine a situation in which loyalty to the social 
ideal apparently involves the sacrifice of the larger self,'® 
as when one voluntarily chooses to live a cramped life in 
order to help a dependent relative. The answer to such 
a criticism is not easy. To be fully satisfying it would 
have to draw upon all that can be known concerning the 
nature and destiny of selfhood. But a suggestion may 
help. Every moral situation has many unrealized possi- 
bilities both of culture and of emotional satisfaction. 
What may seem from the observer's point of view a dreary 
monotonous task, may, to the one performing it from a 
sense of duty, yield a continuous inspiration and serve as 
the occasion of deepest spiritual contentment. When, for 
instance, a young man gives up his cherished ambition 
for a college education and returns to his old home to 
take care of his indigent parents, he does not necessarily 
forfeit the cultural value of such an education. He can 
make himself great and spiritually rich in spite of drudgery 
and pinching poverty. But it often takes a long look into 
the future to make this idea effective in actual practice. 
Because we are moral beings, our desires must be 
dominated by the ideal of what is right. ‘The self thus 
dominated can draw sustenance from any situation where 
it is doing its duty. In weighing the criticism, therefore, 
we should face the alternatives—the transforming, refining, 
inwardly satisfying goods that are possible only to the 
loyal self, and the blighting deteriorating effects of dis- 
loyalty. As we further study the nature and destiny of 
selfhood, the answer to the criticism may be made more 
satisfactory. 

The ideal of self-realization takes over and harmonizes 
all competing conceptions of the summum bonum. It 
does this by showing their limitations and re-interpreting 
them as aspects of itself. But can it be made sufficiently 
definite? Will it yield the principles whereby we may 
arrange the goods of life in a true moral hierarchy? ‘This 
is really the crucial issue. “There can be little question of 


18 Cf, G, F. Fullerton, A Handbook of Ethical Theory, p. 262 f. 


MORAL VALUES 229 


the ideal’s comprehensiveness or of its adaptability; but 
what of its definiteness? ‘The critic points out that any 
good, or for that matter, any experience whatever tends 
to realize the self. But this criticism fails to note that the 
self to be realized is the social self, that is, the self in its 
concrete completeness. When this is borne in mind, the 
task of formulating principles of organization to guide 
in the selection of goods is a matter of detail. For in- 
stance, we may start with the general principle that social 
goods are to be preferred to those that are exclusive. The 
other principles and maxims follow."* 

This conception of the highest good solves many per- 
plexing problems of the moral life. It alone satisfies the 
moral demand for authority. It requires that in all cases 
of reasonable doubt a satisfactory investigation be made 
into the relative desirability of competing goods. To be 
neglectful or careless at this point is morally reprehensible; 
the plea of ignorance does not save from condemnation 
one who has blundered. After the decision has been 
reached and one is reasonably sure what the choice should 
be in the light of the ideal of self-realization, then the 
authority of the ideal is absolute. From it there is no 
appeal. Kant’s categorical imperative is here in place. 
This ideal illuminates the meaning of duty and explains 
the attractiveness of virtue. Duty is the sense of obliga- 
tion felt in cases of conflict between what is impulsively 
desired and what sound judgment indicates is on the 
whole desirable. The old distinction between duties to 
one’s self and duties to others becomes almost meaningless, 
since all duties have the double reference. 

Yet because of our limited insight, a question may 
easily arise as to how far one is justified in devoting one’s 
energies, say, to self-culture in ostensible preparation for 
a career of social usefulness. When, for instance, should 
one’s schooling end and active social duties be taken up? 
In a general) way, such issues are met by appeal to con- 
ventional verdicts, which express the wisdom of society, 


14 Cf. H. W. Wright, Self-Realization, parts iii. and iv. 


230 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


But in all cases of doubt the ideal of the highest good 
alone can decide and that decision is final. It does not 
avail against this authority that we may be utterly and 
flagrantly mistaken as to what the ideal requires; it is 
our duty not to be mistaken; we must pay the forfeit 
when we are. 

Once duties are recognized, virtue is the permanent atti- 
tude of loyalty to what is thought to be right. It means 
inevitable progress in self-realization. At least this is a 
reasonable faith, resting on wide experience as well as on 
a study of the relation of the self to its world. People 
usually accept it as a matter of course. Hence the center 
of one’s interest in the moral life need never be self-realiza- 
tion as a task. One can achieve the result better by con- 
sidering what on the whole will promote social welfare, 
and then undertaking to do one’s part in accordance 
therewith. This requires preparation, equipment, and the 
proper conservation of resources. It means care of one’s 
health, freedom from undue anxiety, the cultivation of 
hopefulness and good cheer, and all that may tend to 
develop physical vigor and spiritual health. In short 
devotion to the social ideal as embodied in home life, 
society, church, state, school, carries with it devotion to 
our own good. 

Our ideal explains also the feeling of remorse which 
follows moral lapses. ‘This feeling is not merely a sense 
of disappointment or regret for failure to win a coveted 
good (as utilitarians would naturally hold); it is far 
more poignant and personal. It differs from disappoint- 
ment also in being keenest after the first offence, and 
srowing rapidly less with each repetition, till it fades 
away entirely. Remorse is the consciousness that the self 
has sustained a serious injury, that its integrity has been 
violated, its ideal of good sacrificed. The reason why 
this sense of personal loss becomes less with each repeti- 
tion of the moral offense is that the moral ideal itself 
becomes lowered. ‘The real social self tends to lose its 
distinctive character and degenerate into a mere absorber 


MORAL VALUES Zoi 


of values which thereby become exclusive. The social 
self shrinks into the centripetal self of ordinary selfishness. 

Self-realization as here interpreted provides further for 
the objectivity of moral values in a most satisfactory way. 
Just as the world of experience is the individual’s own 
construction, yet becomes, through a process already suf- 
ficiently described, a common world with the marks of 
empirical independence, so moral values, when tested by 
the standard of self-realization, are seen to be values not 
only for the self, but for society. When this is accepted 
as a practical basis of living, a wholesome attitude of 
self-devotion, or even of self-abnegation, naturally fol- 
lows. In other words, we need give very little direct 
attention to our governing ideal. Instead of causing us, 
as some critics suggest, to brood over our own states of 
mind or carefully to calculate the effect on ourselves of 
a contemplated course of action, our ideal should induce 
a spirit of self-forgetfulness. It should put a new and 
deeper meaning into such paradoxical maxims as “‘He that 
loseth his life shall find it,’’ ‘‘Die to live.”’ 

The conception of the self as essentially social is recog- 
nized to some extent by most thinking people, though its 
full significance is far from being realized. As an ethical 
ideal it is as old as Christianity, if not older. But it has 
never yet had a chance to reveal on a large scale its trans- 
forming efficiency. Whenever it has begun to be a potent 
factor in the life of Western nations, it has tended to a 
one-sided expression that has really amounted to a per- 
version of its true meaning. “Iwo influences “have been 
at work, the lack of theoretical insight and the dominance 
of institutions over the lives of the people. Christianity 
had scarcely become the official religion of the Roman 
Empire before the tyranny of ecclesiasticism began to sup- 
press individual initiative in matters of belief and conduct. 
The individual was lost in the churchly hierarchy. Sub- 
mergence of the individual has burdened society with mili- 
tarism, excessive nationalism, and an overgrown capitalism 
—to mention only the three most influential institutions 


Ao? THE WORLD AS VALUE 


that have worked against the ethical ideal. Militarism 
reduces the individual to a unit in a fighting machine; 
nationalism provincializes the ideal and makes of it a 
political shibboleth; capitalism tends to mechanize life 
and reduce the individual workman to the status of an 
economic factor in producing wealth. Until these insti- 
tutions can be so modified as to make the ethical ideal 
possible of realization in the social whole,’ we as indi- 
viduals must continue to suffer together the loss of life's 
supreme values. 

Two outstanding problems remain. If our conception 
of the highest good can dispose of these, or even show how 
they may conceivably be met, it has presumably answered 
every reasonable test. “These are the problem of freedom 
and the problem of evil. While neither of these can be 
treated with any approximation to thoroughness, we may 
consider them enough to point the direction in which a 
solution must be sought. As problems they confront 
every theory of morals, though some theories succeed in 
largely ignoring them. “The more objective the treatment 
of the moral life, the less apparent the need of discussing 
either freedom or the problem of evil. But the theory that 
makes self-realization the moral goal encounters these 
problems in their full significance. Nevertheless an ade- 
quate treatment of them must wait upon a development of 
the doctrine of selfhood. 

From the standpoint of self-realization, freedom is the 
power to act according to the ideal of the morally good. 
Thus defined, freedom lies at the basis of the moral life 
and makes that life possible. On first thought there 
seems to be no problem. ‘The direct evidence of experi- 
ence in choosing and striving is apparently sufficient to 
establish the doctrine of freedom. But science, in analyz- 
ing human nature and human conduct, relates them to 
antecedent conditions and to the immediate environment, 
and thus exhibits conduct as a resultant of natural causes. 
Some who feel the force of this kind of evidence seek 
a way of escape in the notion that freedom has only a 


MORAL VALUES Hi 


negative meaning. We are free, they would say, when 
no external compulsion is felt, though at the same time 
we are determined internally by the forces that build 
character. These forces, expressed in the native consti- 
tution of our being, are not felt as constraint, but gain 
expression as impulse, desire, and even rational appeal. 


Such a conception of freedom cannot satisfy the de- 
mands of the moral consciousness. It makes real freedom 
an illusion and leaves the moral life bound. The elab- 
orate attempts to explain moral experiences while holding 
the negative conception have failed and will continue to 
fail, because instead of explaining choice and purposive 
action with reference to a self-originated ideal, they simply 
explain how terms used in moral discussion can be given 
a different meaning in harmony with thoroughgoing 
determinism. ‘The alternatives are the moral life, imply- 
ing freedom in a positive sense, and a thoroughly mechan- 
ized life that but simulates morality. In doing away 
with freedom as a power of intelligent choice, the theorizer 
disposes also of the self, and hence reduces the ideal of 
self-realization to a case of self-deception in which 
there is no self to be deceived. ‘That this is the outcome 
of a strictly scientific treatment of conduct is evident as 
soon as we recall the objective and observational char- 
acter of scientific research. To recognize a self, one must 
transcend the objective viewpoint.’° As for freedom, 
nothing but a self can be free, hence the idea of freedom— 
and shall we say morality ?—is extra-scientific. 

But what of evil? It is ever present, thwarting en- 
deavor, weakening capacity, bringing sorrow, pain, un- 
rest, remorse, and ultimate failure in death. This grim 
fact raises doubts concerning the worth-whileness of 
moral endeavor, and tries one’s faith in the feasibility of 
self-realization as the moral ideal. Before any discussion 
of the subject is entered upon, it is well to recognize that 


15 Cf, Morton Prince, ‘“Three Fundamental Errors of the Behav- 
iorists and the Reconciliation of the Purposive and Mechanistic Con- 
cepts,’ Psychological Bulletin, 1925, p. 101, 


IA THE WORLD AS VALUE 


no final solution of this problem is possible to finite in- 
telligences. Evil pertains to the universe and involves 
cosmic issues. All that is and was and is to be is impli- 
cated. Yet we can come to a provisional solution, cov- 
ering our moral needs, by reflecting on how life’s ills 
actually help to self-realization. “To make this line of 
thought entirely convincing, however, one must posit 
“a life beyond life.”’ Short of this assumption, one can 
get some satisfaction by considering the manifold ways 
in which nature is adapted to be a training-school for 
the development of selfhood. The very indifference of 
nature to our individual preferences is the growing evi- 
dence of its adaptability. If self-realization is possible 
only through self-activity, and if that must be guided 
by intelligence, then evidently the self must have un- 
shaken confidence in nature’s laws. Consequences must be 
inevitable, every act of ours must call forth its definitive 
and appropriate reaction. In this sense the world must 
be a mechanical world to be the basis of the moral life. 

Suppose that the severity of the law of consequences 
might at times be relaxed, what would be the effect on 
us as moral beings? It would undermine the very foun- 
dations of the moral life; we could never be sure of the 
future, never count on nature's being true to itself; what 
is order to-day might be chaos to-morrow—or rather it 
would all be chaos. Neither the intellectual nor the 
moral life can be developed and satisfied except in an im- 
personal world that can be trusted in its mechanical pro- 
cesses. In such a world evil consequences reveal our blun- 
dering or our turpitude, and in so doing stimulate to 
greater watchfulness, closer study of conditions, more 
persistent effort. [his is the kind of world we are living 
in, a world, consequently, of mixed good and evil, where 
the evil in revealing itself urges us on to seek greater 
goods. Every evil mastered makes available goods that 
would not otherwise be within our reach. Nature is not 
only on the side of the enlightened moral will, but at 
every stage of human development yields goods that pre- 


MORAL VALUES 935 


pare the self for a larger life and greater goods. The in- 
creased capacity is met by a vastly wider range of satis- 
factions. The relation between the increase of capacity 
and nature’s response is not reducible to a mathematical 
calculus. So exhaustless are nature’s resources that a 
slight increase of capacity on the part of the self is like 
a key that may open up a whole new world of values. 
Thus nature more than keeps pace with the needs of self- 
hood. 

Goods within goods and beyond goods are character- 
istic of nature. As for pests and disease germs and thwart- 
ings and separations and physical decay and death—these 
must be viewed in the light of their service in promoting 
the higher values of life. Even death, for aught we know, 
may be a gain. But the mystery of evil is ever with us, 
and only infinite insight can completely solve it. In later 
discussion of religious values, a further step toward a 
working solution of the problem can be taken. By con- 
sidering how nature seems adapted to the development in 
us of all the capacities of our being, for the production of 
the higher values, and by considering how those values 
which are of most worth are apparently least dependent 
upon physical sources, we are encouraged to believe that 
what is true within experience will continue to hold when 
the present form of our experience ends. Whatever 
strengthens the moral life makes this belief easier; but it 
is not likely to become a certainty while the present life 
lasts. 

The sting of pessimism is removed when we advance 
beyond the hedonistic outlook and see the self unfolding, 
finding at each stage of its development a world of goods 
adapted to its needs. The perverted or evil will may in- 
fect the stream of life with a poison that generations of 
suffering cannot eliminate. Wanton destruction, as in the 
world war, must carry its baneful consequences into the 
homes of innocent millions. We cannot escape conse- 
quences, and well that it is so. But in the working of the 
law of consequences the good is as inevitable as the evil. 


236 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


The good is good because it is stronger than the evil, so 
that when given its chance it is certain to prevail. Let 
the enlightened good will have its way in the world and 
unimagined resources of nature will be uncovered for the 
common good, society will be redeemed, the laws of hered- 
ity will work for the advent of the higher type, and the 
world will become a human brotherhood.  Self-realiza- 
tion, as the supreme good and the goal of all endeavor, 
meets every test except the mystery of evil, and it comes 
nearer than any other conception to solving that mystery. 
It makes for faith in a progressive triumph over evil and 
its utilization in the development of the higher human 
values. 

Self-realization, then, is the goal of life, the uncondi- 
tional good to which all other goods are to be subordi- 
nated. It gives the law that determines ultimately all 
questions of relative goods; it is the source of all obliga- 
tion, the basis of moral approval, the authority from 
which there is no appeal. Granted that this is true 
for the individual, what of society? Can we look for- 
ward to a social life that will be adequate to the com- 
pleted self of the individual? Certainly not in a society 
constituted as at present. Much that seems necessary to 
its very existence must be outgrown. It would be foolish 
to venture into prophecy at this point, and suggest the 
essential structure of the ideal society. “The many Utopias 
that have been pictured are so out of touch with actual 
conditions as to seem utterly impracticable. But we may 
be sure that when self-realization has advanced even a 
very little beyond the present, certain evils that dog us now 
will be done away. While the structure of our economic 
life now is pagan in its individualism, and puts a premium 
on greed and cunning, we see forces at work to modify 
it in fundamental respects by introducing the principle of 
cooperation. When this principle is embodied in the very 
structure and mechanism of society, the course of devel- 
opment will seem more clearly marked and more easy to 


MORAL VALUES DY. 


attain. Society will be perfected in the realization of the 
individual as a social being. 

But doubts and questions swarm about this vision 
of the future. What of the limitations of human life 
as physically conditioned? With advancing civilization 
human beings will become more and more specialized; 
may it not be that over-specialization will end in maladap- 
tation and final extinction, as has been the case with 
myriad forms of life during geologic times? Furthermore 
the physical sources of life are apparently becoming de- 
pleted; what right have we to assume that they will not, 
with the lapse of centuries and milleniums, drop below 
the limits of human well-being? ‘Then, in thinking of 
the future, we should not forget or ignore the selves that 
are now striving ineffectually to realize their individual 
good. What connection can they have with the ideal of 
a society separated from them by zons of time? What, 
too, of the abortive, defective, perverted, immature selves 
who can have no inspiring outlook, no ideal? When the 
individual ceases to live, his values go down with him. 
What right have we to deny that in this way all human 
values will in time vanish? Such questionings as these 
make the moral ideal look like a fading dream. Life ap- 
pears as a series of beginnings, full of promise but meager 
in fulfilment. What right have we to believe that the 
values dear to human beings will be conserved? ‘To an- 
swer this question even in a provisional way, we must 
pass to the consideration of religious values. 


CHAPTER V 
RELIGIOUS VALUES 


Our present interest in religious values will be limited 
for the most part to those which issue from the highest 
forms of religion. The religious life of primitive and 
semi-civilized peoples is full of interest to the scholar, but 
is not our present concern. 

What are religious values? ‘They are the values that 
come into existence with an accredited belief in God as the 
helper and protector of human beings. Just as different 
people may have widely divergent conceptions of God, so 
religious values may vary. Almost any ideal of supreme 
attractiveness may coalesce with the God-idea and in this 
way become the source of religious values. “Thus nature, 
as physical energy, has been deified; so has the universe as 
the quantitative all or absolute; so have such abstractions 
as social influence, fame, wealth, culture, humanity (as a 
super-individual entity). But whenever such ideals are 
set forth as worthy of religious homage, doubtless much 
more is implied than is expressed in these concepts. What- 
ever is whole-heartedly loved calls into expression an atti- 
tude closely akin to worship. ‘This fact enables the psy- 
chologist to trace a connection between religious emotion 
and emotions from a less exalted source, like the libidos 
of the psychoanalysts. It also explains the perversions of 
religious emotions by ignorant devotees who confuse in- 
tense feelings, whatever their source, with worship. Like 
all other experiences of value, religious values must be 
tested in the light of the whole context of experience. 

Religious values inhere in other values and presup- 
pose them. Every interest in life has the capacity to yield 


238 


RELIGIOUS VALUES 239 


a characteristic religious value; that is, whatever affects 
us for good or ill takes on a distinctive quality when 
viewed as the expression of God’s providential care. The 
good is enhanced in value and the evil is transformed. 
‘Thus religious values have an instrumental character. But 
they are also cherished for their own sakes. They may, 
in the mind of the believer, so far transcend all other 
values as to seem to be the only values worth seeking. As 
instrumental they give assurance that what is of greatest 
worth to us will somehow continue to be ours in spite of 
life’s vicissitudes, that nothing can come between us and 
the supreme Source of all value. This assurance is. based 
on the assumption that divine and human interests are 
essentially the same, and that what man most cherishes, 
God will use his power to conserve. So important is this 
aspect considered by many thinkers that religion may for 
them be defined, in the words of Hoeffding, as ‘‘a belief 
in the conservation of value.’’? 

But if religion should mean as much as this to us, it 
would mean much more. The belief that what we esteem 
most highly is sacred in God’s sight, and that he is deeply 
interested in our well-being, would awaken in us the 
strongest emotional effects of which our natures are cap- 
able. The world of values would become infused with 
God's presence, all goods would be looked upon as his 
gifts, all thwartings, as his method of preparing us for a 
closer communion with him. This intensely personal 
relation to God, if realized, would be by far the most 
powerful stimulus to loyalty, to high endeavor, to self- 
forgetful devotion. Thus religion would become the main- 
spring of all that is most forceful in us. It would con- 
duce as nothing else could to spiritual health and peace. 
By blending the moral ideal of self-realization with the 
ideal of doing God’s will, it would complete the transcen- 
dence of the egoistic attitude; the worshipper would be- 
come God-centered. 

An adequate definition of religion is difficult to formu- 


1 The Philosophy of Religion, § 72. 


240 THE WORLD VASAVACUE 


late because religion is the expression of our whole nature 
and permeates every interest of life. While Hoeffding may 
emphasize belief, others single out the element of feeling, 
and still others find the essence in good works.? As an 
emotional experience religion expresses itself in worship; 
as involving our active nature it issues in doing God's will; 
as intellectually grounded it is a body of beliefs. Without 
the beliefs the emotional expression would be hazy, if not | 
impossible, and religious values could hardly exist. Hence 
our concern will be primarily with the nature and grounds 
of religious beliefs. 

Have we a right to believe in the validity of religious 
values? May they not be illusory? “This portentous ques- 
tion cannot be wholly evaded, though most people avoid 
its deeper consideration. Many who do not care to think 
much on the subject satisfy themselves in part by assuring 
themselves that in the realm of religion everything depends 
on faith. If we believe that the values are real, they by 
that act come into being for us. May not a strong faith 
remove mountains of difficulty? “The quantum of truth 
in this view readily assimilates with the accompanying 
emotional experiences, and thereby renders the believer 
immune to criticism. The circle of his thought is com- 
plete. He knows because he has faith to believe, and his 
experiences establish his faith. Nothing could be simpler 
or more convincing—until we become critical and want 
to know the real grounds of our beliefs. Doubtless faith 
does play an important part in beliefs. As an act of will 
supported by emotional prejudice, faith can determine what 
facts of life shall be admitted to consideration, and what 
their relative importance shall be. It can pack the jury 
and insure the verdict. But in doing so it demonstrates, 
not the authority of truth, but one’s capacity to believe. 
Among devout people may be found abundant illustration 
of faith in puerilities that have become sacred by being 
believed. Such an attitude toward doctrinal matters in 


2 For definitions of religion see Leuba, A Psychological Study of 
Religion, Appendix; Pratt, The Religious Consciousness, chap. i, 


RELIGIOUS VALUES 241 


religion blocks inquiry, impedes progress, and perpetuates 
ancient errors that the world at large has cast out. It 
means, first, self-deception, and then obscurantism. Even 
as a demonstration of faith, the attitude is faulty. To 
doubt reason is the fundamental heresy, and when the 
devotee takes refuge from rational inquiry in an appeal to 
faith, he exemplifies a pernicious type of scepticism. He 
virtually says that if all the facts were faced with an open 
mind, his beliefs would be confounded. Faith has its 
essential place in the religious life, as elsewhere; but being 
based on evidence, it must not usurp the place of evidence. 

Faith, however, as the act of venturing upon evidence, 
making the hazard in spite of uncertainties, brings to light 
further evidence. It is the primary means of testing con- 
clusions, whether in the field of religion or elsewhere. 
Moreover the word faith may cover the unanalyzed 
residuum of our experiences that impels to belief. We 
seldom, if ever, can tell all the reasons for a given deci- 
sion. This is true even in the most ordinary affairs of 
life. It is more manifestly true in those complex and less 
understood realms of the higher sentiments and abstract 
constructions. A belief represents the assent of the entire 
self, and no one, however skilled in self-analysis, can set 
forth all the hidden sources of conviction. Hence after all 
the known reasons are given we often have to say that we 
believe because we believe, recognizing that the main 
sources lie in the unfathomed depths of the self. Psycho- 
logical analysis is bringing to light some of these sources— 
racial inheritances, habits of thought and emotional expres- 
sion, drives and bents of nature that assert themselves in 
unaccountable ways. “These and many not yet singled out 
have their place and influence in determining belief. The 
term faith may by a legitimate adaptation include belief 
arising from such elemental sources. It is also true that 
we act upon genuine evidence of which we may not at the 
time be conscious. We interpret a quality of voice, a foot- 
step, a motion of the body in walking, as meaning a par- 
ticular individual in a particular mood, We act thus on 


242 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


faith. Accordingly the term faith has an honorable place 
in the vocabulary of religious belief, even though it cannot 
take the place of such evidence as can be logically tested 
according to recognized principles of evidence. There is 
no substitute for facing the facts of experience and letting 
them have their due authority over us. Yet when, with- 
out prepossessions, we seek to read the indications of nature 
and of human life, we find a mass of confusingly ambigu- 
ous evidence. “To make this yield any plausible conclusion 
whatever, it must be broadly interpreted in the light of all 
we have thus far studied. When the evidence is all in, 
faith will have its right to appropriate and apply. 

The question of validity may be considered from three 
points of view—the historical, the authoritative, and the 
philosophical. Each gives important material affecting our 
decision. Later we shall see how these are interrelated. 
Let us consider them in order. 

So far as is known, every group of people, whether 
clan, tribe, or nation, has some form of religion. In the 
earlier stages of civilization, religion was so intertwined 
with social custom as to seem its supernatural sanction. 
Since tribal customs were the essence of tribal wisdom and 
had divine sanction, variations from them were severely 
punished. ‘Tradition ruled supreme. As intelligence ad- 
vanced, the distinctive features of religion were slowly 
differentiated from the workaday life, and a sacred caste 
srew up that had charge of religious interests. [hus the 
priesthood became a part of the institutional life of the 
people. ‘The priest by virtue of his position as custodian 
of sacred things—temples, totems, ritual, sacrifices, magic 
formulae—was the main conservator of the old as against 
innovations. But as tribe was compelled to join with 
tribe for mutual protection or by reason of defeat in battle, 
traditions were disturbed and the way was opened for 
progress. At first the gods were looked upon as little 
removed in power and wisdom from the worshippers. 
Hence the ethical element in religious observances was not 
much in evidence. But the changes that were introduced 


RELIGIOUS VALUES 243 


with the rise of nations tended to exalt the gods and stim- 
ulate the worshippers to a higher type of living. Morals 
became an increasingly vital part of religious practice. 
‘There seems to be trustworthy evidence that practically 
all primitive peoples believed in a diffused spiritual power, 
quasi personal and manifested in the activities of external 
objects. This all-pervasive power has been christened 
mana (a Melanesian word, meaning about the same as the 
Indian word, manitou). Some students of early religions 
have inclined to the belief that the widespread worship of 
mana indicates that the original religion of mankind was 
monotheistic. But this theory has little except an im- 
perfect analogy to support it. The conception of mana 
seems to have been extremely vague and elusive. Even 
now after much observation and study, anthropologists 
are not agreed as to whether mana was an all-pervasive, 
attenuated substance called spirit, unitary in nature though 
many in its manifestations, or whether it was as multi- 
farious as the forms of its expression. “The evidence seems 
to indicate that primitive man had a confused sense of a 
presence which could pass from object to object, from 
person to person, bestowing unusual power on the recipi- 
ent. It was one in being power, yet it became so much 
a part of the object it inhabited that it seemed capable of 
unlimited division. That primitive man did not think 
of this presence as a definite personality is evident from all 
that we know of primitive ideas and customs. In the ini- 
tial stages of culture people did not possess the conception 
of personality as we now understand the term. “They had 
the tribal consciousness. [he individual tribesman simply 
thought and acted in accordance with tribal traditions. 
Nevertheless they peopled their world with quasi per- 
sonal spirits, infused with the power of mana. ‘These 
spirits were charged with responsibility for all that hap- 
pened. Because the modern conception of natural law 
had not yet been worked out, the technique of control over 


3 Cf. Durkheim, The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life, p. 
192 ff. 


244 THE: WORLDIVASIN AIOE 


the spirits was extremely crude. ‘The practice of magic was 
all the applied science that primitive peoples knew. It 
entered into every phase of their religious and social life. 
So implicitly did early man believe in magic that, even 
among relatively intelligent peoples like the Hindus and 
Persians, the power of magic formulae was thought to be 
irresistible, controlling the great gods of heaven. ‘These 
pre-scientific methods of influencing the higher powers seem 
childish to us now, but they testify to the universality of 
a certain god-consciousness. 

With the advent of modern science a new way of look- 
ing at the forces in nature began to prevail. No longer 
did it seem necessary to assume a God in the heavens; 
nature's activities could all be referred to the “‘reign of 
law.’’ But even with such an outlook, man continued 
to be religious. His innate cravings sought satisfaction 
in various ways. Many devout people turned against the 
findings and reasonings of science. “They preferred to cling 
to their beliefs at all hazards. Others tried to hold their 
science in One compartment of their intellectual life and 
their religious beliefs in another. “This worked badly for 
obvious reasons. Still others, accepting science as their 
guide, yet unable to avoid sceptical conclusions, invented 
the “Religion of Humanity.’’ This religion was sufh- 
ciently vague to appeal to the emotions and fire the imagi- 
nation. It kept the mind and heart of the worshipper 
close to the moral task of service to society, and thus 
satisfied in large measure the moral sense. So long as 
no attempt was made to interpret the ideal of humanity 
in terms of actual human beings, the object of worship 
might be a god who looked like a man. Yet these vari- 
ous attitudes were essentially makeshifts, and could not 
permanently meet the needs of growing intelligence. 
Their persistence even into the present emphasizes the 
ineradicable need of religion. 

History, then, points to the prevalence of religion in 
some form, but does not, except in a general way, indi- 
cate what beliefs the consensus genttum would validate.. 


RELIGIOUS VALUES 245 


May we conclude that in this way we are authorized to 
believe in the overruling Power who shapes human des- 
tiny? If we could find in history a justification for this 
belief, we might by means of it validate many other be- 
liefs. But a general demurrer against this conclusion 
might run as follows: Belief in God or gods has here- 
tofore been a necessity, because man lived in the presence 
of forces he did not understand. But he is slowly bring- 
ing all these forces under natural law, and thereby making 
belief in supernatural interposition quite unnecessary. In 
time life will adjust itself to this intellectual situation, 
and religion will vanish from the earth. ‘To set this 
reasoning aside, something more than history will be 
needed. 

In the confusion and uncertainty of conflicting beliefs, 
the vast majority of people take refuge in authority as 
determining for them what they should believe—the 
authority of sacred scriptures, of an inspired church, of a 
general council, or even of some great personality. <A 
man who thus surrenders himself may be sure of spiritual 
comfort. He need no longer be harried by questionings 
and doubts. ‘“The sages of old spake as they were moved 
by the spirit of God. Who am I that I should gainsay 
them?’’ The appeal to authority has much in its favor, 
especially when that authority, as in the case of the Chris- 
tian Scriptures and the creedal statements of the churches, 
represents the best in the religious thinking of many cen- 
turies. One may well argue that the sacred writings 
became sacred just because they so adequately met the 
needs of the people. What folly then for the individual 
to turn away from such teachings and set up himself 
as a higher authority! 

And yet external authority is always open to attack 
from various quarters. “To begin with, there are many 
authorities and they conflict. Deciding among them 
means using private judgment. If some law-giving body 
promulgates an official decision, it begins immediately to 
handicap itself and mortgage its future. For either the 


246 THE WORLD ASI VAIUE 


decision must stand for all generations, even though out 
of harmony with the best thought of religious people, or 
the decision must in time be revised in the light of addi- 
tional insight; and that involves the exercise of private 
judgment. In fact the original pronouncement cannot be 
other than the judgment of some individual or group of 
individuals, It is not a question merely between primi- 
tive beliefs and those that appeal to the more enlightened 
mind. No creedal interpretation, however definite and 
official, can be wholly without ambiguity. Every be- 
liever must exercise his best judgment as to what the 
accepted statement may mean. In spite of all authority, 
ecne’s conceptions of God and man and destiny reflect 
one’s whole experience of life, and vary accordingly. 

Moreover the appeal to authority in crucial issues is 
unsatisfactory because it: halts the search for pertinent 
evidence. It is an act of despair, an expression of unfaith 
in one’s self, a surrender of one’s dearest prerogative as 
an intelligent being. Founded on human weakness, it 
has no abiding strength in itself to sustain the shock of 
critical attack. It provokes scepticism, if indeed it is not 
itself a form of scepticism. The appeal to authority, 
therefore, may well call out the retort that such support 
makes religion pre-scientific, a relic of the age of magic 
and spiritism. Then might plausibly follow the pro- 
phecy made by not a few critics of religion that the day 
will come when all religion will be looked upon as merely 
a pleasant form of illusion. The only way to meet such 
criticism is to bring religious beliefs out from under cover 
of authority and submit them to the severest tests of 
reason and experience. 

Of course the venturesome student who asserts his 
independence of external authority and hazards thinking 
for himself assumes a grave responsibility. Authority in 
religious beliefs like authority in morals and politics rep- 
resents many generations of experience and earnest think- 
ing; it is the compacted wisdom of the past. To have 
a right to take issue with it, one should show that he has 


RELIGIOUS VALUES 247 


mastered its best expression, that he knows the elements 
of truth contained in it and knows that it is not adequate. 
This means that the innovator has no moral right to his 
opposing views unless he has done some arduous think- 
ing. The debonair attitude of some present-day writers 
on radicalism in religion and morals is to be deplored. 
They are usually ill-informed. It is much easier to com- 
mand a brilliant style in catering to the reckless spirit of 
the times than to subject oneself to the labor of searching 
out the truth. Authority rules in most of life—the 
authority of convention in matters small and great. Were 
it not for the authority of our social heritage, we should 
lapse back toward the pre-stone age. But authority in 
religious belief is especially unattractive at the present 
time because of the conviction that vast progress has been 
made during the recent centuries. Accuracy of analysis 
and measurement has given us many new insights into life 
and its subconscious drives. Nevertheless the very con- 
centration of attention and effort upon the objective 
aspects has meant the neglect of much that is of the most 
vital significance to the spiritual life. The only escape 
from authority in religion is by way of laborious reéxam- 
ination of the field of modern knowledge from the stand- 
point of the self. “his means the philosophical approach. 

What, then, of the philosophical approach? This 
method of attack has a signal advantage over all others 
inasmuch as it includes, appraises, and transcends them. 
By a justifiable extension of the term philosophical, we 
may make it cover all critical efforts to find out the truth 
of religion. Religious beliefs are beliefs in certain forms 
of reality, hence are strictly philosophical in their charac- 
ter. If philosophy cannot justify these beliefs, thinking 
people will have to discard them. When once the ulti- 
mate grounds of belief or doubt are found, the supplemen- 
tary value of the consensus gentium and of authority can 
be utilized in producing conviction. If there is a solid 
basis for belief in God and his effectual interest in human- 
ity, we should find in every department of life indications 


248 DHE WORLD VAS ay ADE 


favoring such belief. The more deeply we probe into 
human nature and its essential interests, the more une- 
quivocal and convincing should these indications become. 
A preliminary suggestion, therefore, will prepare us for 
the more difficult considerations that follow. 

It is a commonplace among thoughtful people that 
one who makes the lower (or exclusive) goods of life 
his aim quickly reaches the limit of enjoyment. Nature 
is soon exhausted in its resources, and can only duplicate 
without enhancing such goods. ‘These values are ephem- 
eral though basal. Besides there is no necessary connec- 
tion between the health and well-being of the self and 
the particular kind of basal values that make life possible. 
That is, the physical basis of life, and with it all the 
goods that center in the physical, might conceivably be 
other than they are. We might, for instance, be so con- 
ditioned in our bodily expression as to live with perfect 
ease and comfort in the sun. But when we advance to 
the social values the situation is different. The self is 
essentially social. Its more permanent and all-encompass- 
ing values are social in their nature. As these values are 
cultivated and made the goal of endeavor, we find nature 
able with increasing ease and simplicity to furnish the 
conditions of their attainment. The simple life with 
spiritual values is the life most favored by nature. It 
means plain living and high thinking. Such facts sug- 
gest that the goods most valued are the ones most con- 
served even by the physical structure of the universe. 

Another fact of common observation tends to support 
this suggestion. Nature is marvelously adapted to teach- 
ing through experience just those lessons which make for 
the development of the self. No good that physical 
nature yields gives all the satisfaction anticipated, because 
the effort to obtain a given good develops a capacity, opens 
up the self to a larger good, one more desirable. “Thus 
rature seems to lure us on to self-expression and self- 
development. This points to the possibility of a cosmic 
plan in the very structure of physical nature for the reali- 


RELIGIOUS VALUES 249 


zation and conservation of the higher human values. Such 
a conclusion has frequently been. drawn, but as it is evi- 
dently of supreme significance in a religious world-view, 
the heaviest guns in the arsenal of thought have played 
upon it. [he more man wants it to be true, the more 
critical he should be. We shall need, therefore, to face 
every form of adverse criticism, and let nothing deter us 
from doing full justice to such criticism, inasmuch as life’s 
major interests are involved. 

The attack upon the theistic belief may come from the 
intellectual (theoretical) or the practical side of life. 
From the one we are made to understand that the exist- 
ence of God cannot be proved by logic. From the other 
we are presented with the portentous problem of evil. In 
the study of these two sources of scepticism, we will en- 
deavor to show that the intellectual inconsequence in the 
theistic argument is indecisive because it arises from a 
defect of method, while the problem of evil may still 
remain a problem without shattering our belief, because 
after the worst is said, life normally proves abundantly 
worth living. If, on the way, we can succeed in finding 
a satisfactory method of approach that will correct the 
intellectual inconsequence, and also an insight into life’s 
real meaning and destiny that will solve the problem of 
evil so far as human interests are concerned, we shall feel 
justified in concluding that the religious values have been 
validated. 

The spirit of our age is impatient of all reasoning in 
the field of religious belief that does not lay hold on expe- 
rience. Such impatience has behind it the centuries of 
futile effort when the keenest minds failed to produce 
abiding conviction by their persistent and subtle dialectic. 
But the traditional arguments that have survived the 
centuries have more than a mere historical interest. Their 
vitality in spite of their inconsequence points to an abid- 
ing quality that the form of the arguments partly conceals, 
These traditional arguments are three in number and are 
known as the ontological, the cosmological, and the teleo- 


250 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


logical arguments. “To them should be added a fourth, 
the moral argument, which mediates the transition from 
the purely intellectual to the practical appeal. 

The most abstract of these arguments is the ontolog- 
ical, so called because it pertains only to the being of God. 
It originated with St. Anselm, but received modifications 
and additions from later speculators. “The argument con- 
cludes that the very idea of a most real Being (ens 
realissimum) implies its existence, since a being would be 
less than the most real if its reality were only conceptual. 
Descartes, in restating the argument, added that the idea 
of an infinite Being could not have originated in a finite 
human mind, and hence must have been implanted there 
by the infinite One himself. Modern psychology sets 
aside this Cartesian suggestion as of no evidential value. 
The Anselmic form of the argument called out the 
Kantian rejoinder that the thought of a most real Being 
no more implies its existence than the conception of a 
bundred dollars implies that they exist. To this criti- 
cism Hegel replied that the idea of the most real Being is 
unique, in that it is the only idea adequate to its reality, 
all others being defective because they leave something 
unexpressed.‘ ‘This reply carries weight only for those 
who agree with Hegel, that the rational is the real and 
the real the rational. Without discussing at present this 
Hegelian dictum, we shall go on to consider the other 
two arguments. 

The cosmological argument was so called because it 
undertook to advance from the fact of order and depen- 
dence in nature to the conclusion that an unconditioned 
First Cause existed. This argument was also criticized 
by Kant as being essentially the ontological argument in 
a disguised form. He contended that the cosmological 
argument, of itself, could prove at best only the existence 
of a power adequate to produce the known effects, which 


4 Proslogium, chap. iii. 

5 Meditations, Med. iii. 

6 Critique of Pure Reason, A, p. 599. 
" Loot p. 107 £. 


RELIGIOUS VALUES 251 


seemed to Kant to fall far short of proving the existence 
of an absolutely unconditioned Being. To reach the 
latter conclusion one must pass over to the ontological 
argument by arbitrarily identifying the more or less 
limited first cause of the known effects with the ens 
realisssmum. Kant pointed out also that the uncondi- 
tioned is really unthinkable, since to think is to condi- 
tion.® ‘This criticism seems to be valid. So long as we 
move on the intellectual plane we can never reach an 
unconditioned. Nor can we on this plane pass logically 
from the idea of a most real being to its reality. The 
inconsequence in these two arguments is evident. It is 
well to note also, in this connection, that while we remain 
on the exclusively intellectual plane, we cannot even prove 
the existence of the finite self. “The idea of a finite self 
does not imply its existence, nor does the idea of condi- 
tionedness in experience imply that a self exists on which 
the conditioned in experience depends. 

But the third or teleological argument carries us some- 
what beyond the vicious circle of intellectualism. It con- 
cludes from the evidence of purpose in nature to the exist- 
ence of a supreme Being who works according to a purpose 
for the whole of nature. In living organisms, if not in 
the rest of nature, we meet conditions that cannot be 
entirely explained by mechanical laws. An organism is 
a complex unity in which the parts function with refer- 
ence to one another and to the whole. It seems to embody 
and progressively to realize a purpose or end. If on the 
strength of this seeming we decide that it does, then we 
may feel justified in concluding that purpose or design is 
the higher category inclusive of mechanism, and that the 
power adequate to the production of nature must be an 
intelligence. Kant’s criticism of this argument was less 
successful than his criticism of the other two, just because 
he was unable to maintain in his criticism the strictly 
intellectual point of view. He held that the teleological 


8 Op. cit., A, pp. 603-614. Cf. Mansel, The Philosophy of the 
Conditioned; also H. Spencer, First Principles, pt. i. § 13. 


252 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


argument (called by him the physico-theological argu- 
ment) could at best prove only an external artificer or 
cosmic architect. But one might reply that the argument 
must prove either more or less than the existence of a 
world architect. If design in nature is interpreted with 
strict reference to intellectualistic limitations, nothing is 
proved except that the idea of design suggests the idea 
of a designer. If, however, the argument means that the 
objectively real world gives evidence of design or of ex- 
pressing purpose, we can conclude from our own experi- 
ences of purposive activity that an intelligent Power is 
operating in nature. We should then be reasoning from 
the concrete existence to the concrete cause. But the crux 
of the teleological argument is the proof that such a thing 
as objective purpose exists in nature. 

These three arguments in their traditional form are 
faulty in so far as they ignore the practical or volitional 
side of life. “Their overweening intellectualism not only 
holds them encased within the limits of mere concepts, 
but keeps them apart in bald isolation. If we try with 
Kant to bring them into connection, they seem to coalesce 
in the inconsequent ontological argument. ‘This is cer- 
tainly true of the first two arguments. The teleological 
argument apparently stands on a different footing, just 
because it can hardly be stated without reference to voli- 
tion. All three arguments contain elements of truth that 
only need restating from the viewpoint of practical expe- 
rience to render powerful support to the theistic conclu- 
sion. But this restatement must recognize the whole of 
experience including the self as the experient. 

What, then, do these attempts at theistic proof mean 
when interpreted, not as logical manipulations of objec- 
tive data, but as referring to the world of experience? 
The change of meaning is momentous, resulting in a great 
enhancement of convincing power. The ontological 
argument is now seen to accentuate a thoroughly attested 
truth, namely, that the world we know and reason about 

9 Op. cit., A, pp. 620-630. 


RELIGIOUS VALUES jhe 


has a thought structure which we ourselves give it, and 
that its reality is a product of the experiencing self work- 
ing responsively, in perfect codperation with a Power 
which must be of like nature. A moment’s reflection will 
make this rather sweeping conclusion seem inevitable. It 
follows from the known character of all our experiences 
of the phenomenal world. ‘The objects that constitute 
external nature are such that we can trust them implicitly, 
in so far as we know the laws of their ongoing. As they 
are for us what they are because the self is controlled in 
its apprehension of them, their knowability means that 
the Power operating on and controlling the self adapts 
itself momentarily and perfectly to the active nature of 
intelligent selfhood. Nothing short of a supreme Intelli- 
gence could do this. “The ontological argument is in har- 
mony also with another consideration which strengthens, 
if possible, the conclusion just drawn. The world of 
actual sense perception is vastly simpler than the world 
as it would appear to an infinite Intelligence. It is this 
world as it would be for infinite Intelligence that we 
take to be the real world and the ultimate standard of 
comparison by which we determine the approximation 
to reality in our own objective constructions. This real 
world then, if it exists at all, can be the experience only 
of an Intelligence immeasurably above our own. His 
thought would be completely adequate for reality, 
whereas ours is not, because we are finite. 

The cosmological argument from the viewpoint of 
experience is no longer a reasoning from the existence of 
conditions to the reality of the unconditioned considered 
as intellectual content. Viewed as the experience of a self, 
the world in which can be traced the dynamic connec- 
tions of dependence is a world in which the principle of 
order is exemplified. It is a world of law, order, mutual- 
ity. This is the primal fact, and the further statement 
that the parts are interconnected is an inference. The 
basic truth of the argument, then, must be found in this 
primal assertion of order, not necessarily in the theory 


204 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


of dynamic connection. In fact the term dynamic loses 
most of its significance when subjected to criticism, since 
it is not by hypothesis permitted to retain any trace of 
productive causality. But the more we reflect upon the 
fact of order in the outside world, the more significant 
it becomes. Intelligence is our only principle of order. 
That a world practically infinite in complexity and ever 
changing should exemplify, throughout its entire extent, 
moment by moment down the ages, perfect amenability 
to the principle of order, is evidence that it is the work 
of intelligence. [his statement recognizes the part played 
by the finite mind in ‘“‘discovering’’ order by judicious 
selection of material and generalizations in which partic- 
ulars in their uniqueness are ignored. “The world is thus 
adapted to our finite mind. If we knew more and could 
think better, we doubt not but that the adaptations would 
appear more striking. “The knowability of the world 
points to the intelligence of its Source.*° When we try 
to think out the implications of the theory that the ulti- 
mate source is unintelligent we can find not the least sug- 
gestion that its activity could issue in anything other than 
utter chaos, opaque to mind whether finite or infinite. 
The teleological argument brings us into the presence 
of concrete experience. It gathers up into itself all that is 
especially valuable in the other two arguments and adds 
its own elements of strength. It interprets the intelligible 
structure of the world, the presence of order and coherence 
throughout nature, as meaning that the ever-changing 
universe is moving toward a goal known, at least, to 
the ultimate Intelligence. It declares that this inconceiv- 
ably vast generalization is justified both by the consider- 
ations mentioned and by the detailed study of nature, 
especially in connection with the phenomena of life. A 
living organism, as Kant pointed out, is that in which all 
is reciprocally both means and end."! It may be analyzed 
into mechanically related parts, but as alive it forms a 


10 Cf. B. P. Bowne, Metaphysics, revised edition, p. ili. 
11 Kritik of Judgment, § 65. 


RELIGIOUS VALUES 255 


whole, a unit with manifest purposiveness. As Kant 
further argues, if there are such products in nature, prod- 
ucts that cannot be explained by purely mechanical laws, 
a teleological principle, which alone can explain them, 
must take precedence over the mechanistic principle. 
When the self is made central, all this needs very slight 
restatement. The self reénacts itself more or less com- 
pletely in every object. Inasmuch as its objects are its 
experiences, they are throughout purposive; and inasmuch 
as they are the joint product of the self and the independ- 
ent Source of stimulations, the two working in perfect 
accord, the inference seems inescapable that the controlling 
Power must itself be purposive in its activities. This is 
the revised teleological argument on the lowest rung of its 
meaning. When it is made to include the experiences of 
the world as value, the world as a social whole, the world 
as a fit place for the development of selfhood, the argu- 
ment becomes decisive. 

We seem shut up to the conclusion that whatever 
complex activities are construable by intelligence must 
ultimately be the work of intelligence. Nothing in our 
experience cantradicts this, and within the limits of expe- 
riential proof everything seems to support it. “Thought 
itself is essentially purposive and cannot rest in any ex- 
planation—such as the mechanical—that stops short of 
the purpose involved. Either the world is the expression 
of purpose or it is opaque to reason. On the authority, 
then, of the self, trying to understand itself and its cosmic 
environment, we may conclude that the universe is the 
expression of a Self working purposively. 

But it is easy to make out a case against this conclusion. 
One may urge the ever-present and ominous fact of evil. 
The element of evil in experience includes not only physi- 
cal pains and suffering, but spiritual unrest, hope deferred, 
tedium, dread, fear, the sense of failure, and forebodings 
of ultimate extinction. What of a being that fills our 
world with such things? Nature seems to be indifferent 
to us. It is apparently more concerned about the dance 


256 THEY WORLD VAST VALE 


of atoms than the preservation of human beings. [hus 
we confront again the problem of evil. The consideration 
of the theistic bearings of this problem leads to the moral 
argument. ‘This is the most vital argument of all; for 
what needs proof is God’s goodness, not his existence. 
How can we vindicate God’s goodness and yet recognize 
the prevalence and persistence of all the ills that plague us? 
Some of our keenest thinkers accept the dilemma—either 
God is not all-powerful and all-knowing, or he is not 
good; and they prefer to believe in his goodness. God 
means well, but he has to deal with intractable condi- 
tions.27. ‘To many, on the other hand, the conception of 
a finite God (or Absolute) is obnoxious; it is tantamount 
to a denial that there is a God. Among these, some, like 
F. H. Bradley, hold that the Absolute, while infinite in 
power, is indifferent to moral distinctions and to human 
interests.7° 


The believers in the finiteness of God call attention 
to certain obvious facts. Human beings are separate enti- 
ties exercising a measure of freedom. God is morally 
obligated to let them have their way within prescribed 
limits. Moreover God could not create a moral universe 
and not include the possibility of evil. He did the best 
he could. His limitations were self-imposed, since he 
chose to create man and to make the world a training 
place for character. “They insist further that the con- 
ception of God.as indifferent to moral values seems seri- 
ously to discount his intelligence; it makes him appear 
to us as managing a vast enterprise, involving zons of 
time and unlimited energy, without any sufficient rea- 
son. [he reply that he may be cosmically active for 
his own pleasure fails to save his intelligence. When the 
human or value-producing element is removed from the 
world, only meaningless motions of atoms remain, which 


12Cf, J. M. McTaggart, Some Dogmas of Religion, chap. vii.; 
William James, A Pluralistic Universe, Lecture viii.; Hastings Rash- 
dall, The Theory of Good and Evil, vol. ii. p. 344 ff, 

18 Appearance and Reality, chap. xxv. 


RELIGIOUS VALUES Lae 


can at best yield but insipid pleasure. It is not strange, 
therefore, that those who think of the world as a “‘for- 
tuitous concourse of atoms’ should deny that the ulti- 
mate power is intelligent. 

But what of the evils of the world? For thorough- 
going hedonists they are still evils and only evils. As 
we saw when discussing the nature of the moral values, 
hedonism leads to pessimism, wherein nothing is in the 
end worth while. Such hedonism as escapes this out- 
come is so modified by considerations of human worth 
that it should no longer bear that name. As we ad- 
vance from this demonstrably unsatisfactory moral ideal 
to that of self-realization, we notice a progressive trans- 
formation of the problem of evil. “Two insights are 
decisive in this transformation, to both of which we have 
already referred. 

First, the possibility of evil is involved in the very 
nature of a moral order. If selves are to be developed and 
matured into the fullness of life, some such order as 
we find in nature must be the condition. Every act must 
carry with it its own consequences as provided by the 
physical structure. Blundering and the evil will must 
mean suffering. A Being who is infinite in power and is 
infinitely good could apparently not do otherwise than 
carry out undeviatingly our every volition, whatever that 
may be, when we meet the conditions provided in nature. 
This constitutes the perfect school of experience and can- 
not be improved upon. We have only to reflect on the 
moral and intellectual havoc that would result if the ulti- 
mate Power were a respecter of persons, arbitrarily favor- 
ing and shielding some from the consequences of their 
acts, while leaving others to their fate. This would not 
only make a vigorous moral life impossible, but would 
undermine the foundations of science. History teaches 
us this lesson in a variety of ways. Such a conception of 
God, once held by a considerable portion of the Western 
world, is now seen to be intolerable. The presence of 
evil, then, is indirectly an evidence that nature is on the 


258 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


side of forethought, loyalty, justice, and the other moral 
qualities that make for abundant life. 

But some are inclined at this point to press the ob- 
jection that if the physical order is at the same time a 
moral order, it should favor the good will because it is 
good, whereas there is no evidence in experience that such 
is the case. “The best of intentions will not save a good . 
enterprise or protect the well-meaning operator if the 
objective conditions of success are not satisfied. Nature 
does not consider intentions, good or bad; it concerns 
itself only with the conditions. When they are met the 
results follow, with no regard for the feeling or fate of 
those involved. One ignorant but well-meaning indi- 
vidual can cause a devastating fire or an epidemic or the 
betrayal of a whole nation in a critical moment of its 
existence. Nature responds to his blundering in exactly 
the same way as it would if the consequences had been 
most desirable. How can such tragic indifference to human 
welfare be squared with the belief in a beneficent Being 
supreme over nature’s processes? ‘Ihe answer has been 
given in the preceding paragraph. What a world this 
would be if good intentions of themselves should exercise 
any influence in its management! We should quickly 
betake ourselves to the pleasant task of formulating and 
cultivating right sentiments. ‘“‘If wishes were horses.” 
The absurdity of such a scheme is evident. It would be 
morally intolerable. Nature must be impersonal in its 
activities, its responses to will attitudes must be inevitable, 
or there would be no orderly world, no home of the 
spirit, no nature. The last word of nature is always, 
Take heed. 

The other insight, which follows from the foregoing, 
is that cosmic or physical evil is relative to good and 
gets all its meaning from this connection. The more 
manifest and abundant the goods, the more inevitable 
the evil, since the goods we do not want at the moment 
or that we do not yet know how to use are more or 
less an incumbrance; they get in the way. From this 


RELIGIOUS VALUES 259 


point of view, evil is a felt superfluity of goods. In the 
case of the misuse of goods, the uncomfortable conse- 
quences (pain, sickness, loss of power, and the like) may 
serve as moral and intellectual awakeners, and thus make 
for progress in the moral life. 

In this connection it is often pointed out that human 
beings are brought into, the world without their will, 
that they are weighted by their heritage, and often so 
mortgaged to an evil life or so poorly endowed with 
discernment that their course of blundering and crimin- 
ality is at birth already predetermined. Multitudes are 
born to suffering and failure. No one is what he might 
be. Quite true, must be the answer. It means that the 
generations are linked together in a thousand ways for 
better or worse, that we are not only our brother's 
keeper, but are profoundly responsible for the character 
and comfort of succeeding generations in so far as we con- 
tribute to them by parenthood or influence. But this is 
only a striking and impressive exemplification of the 
law of social development. Our every act has a signifi- 
cance beyond ourselves, and a little carelessness or a little 
unusual forethought may have consequences momentous 
for multitudes of people. No wonder the human race 
progresses so slowly when its worst members can thwart 
by their incompetence and maladjustments the good that 
many times their number may be able to effect. 

Two closely related suggestions go far to relieve the 
portentous character of this charge against the essential 
goodness of the world Power. ‘The first is the converse 
of the charge. Just as one generation can bind the next 
and the evil from generation to generation can become 
cumulative, so the good will, taking advantage of the law 
of connection, can greatly accelerate advance in all de- 
sirable ways. The laws of social solidarity have limitless 
capacity for good in building up through the centuries 
a higher type of manhood. ‘The second suggestion is 
that the sense of responsibility which the laws of heredity 
awaken in the individual becomes normally a powerful 


260 THES WORDD WAS HV ALIN E 


stimulus to right living. One is not likely to become reck- 
less in his manner of life if one realizes that future genera- 
tions are to suffer as a result. “Then, too, the very sense 
of connection makes the attachment of parent and child 
the source of many spiritual values not otherwise con- 
ceivable. The binding together of the generations in 
mutual responsibility and interest may be_ beneficent 
through and through. But like all other natural provi- 
sions that have vast capacities for good, it can be per- 
verted to evil by the will of men. Responsibility for 
the mischief wrought by the evil will—and who can 
measure it?—-must be shared by man. When we have 
cleared our own record, we may be able to see how God 
can be good and let the evil will do its worst. By its. 
very nature the evil will thwarts itself. 

But such considerations are apt to lose much of their 
persuasive power when we fix our attention on the sub- 
human world and there see so much that is un-ideal. No 
such reason as self-development can be offered in explana- 
tion. We should not, however, draw hasty conclusions 
in this field. ‘he pain and suffering incident to the 
struggle for existence can easily be exaggerated. Animals 
do not trouble themselves much about the struggle for 
existence or the survival of the fittest. They know how 
to have a good time; their death is generally sudden and 
with little pain. Without remorse or an accusing con- 
science or a haunting imagination of impending danger, 
they are consistent hedonists, living in the present mo- 
ment of good or facing with courage and cunning the dan- 
ger that may impend. Moreover we do not know what 
purpose they subserve, nor do we know anything about 
their destiny. [hey have rights, however, that even man 
should respect. As among humankind, so throughout the 
animal world, the obligation not to produce unnecessary 
suffering is binding on all. The more we know of ani- 
mal life through sympathetic contact and association, the 
more we are apt to find there indications of beneficence 
in the possibilities of happiness resident in animal nature. 


RELIGIOUS VALUES pnzol 


But the situation in the sub-human world is not our 
problem. The subject is mentioned here only to suggest 
that we are not justified in reading into the lives of ani- 
mals the restlessness, depression, anxiety, remorse, and 
forebodings that make up a large part of human ills. The 
evils that beset the developing self are the ones we must 
face. To see that they result from nature's guarantee of 
fidelity in carrying out our volitions is to shift the bur- 
den largely from nature to ourselves. 

Yet there is one evil which tops them all and which 
no forethought can avoid—the last great evil, which in 
terminating life cuts short the career of self-development, 
renders futile all our plans, brings to naught all values. 
Death seems so useless, so wanton, so diabolical a destruc- 
tion of values that mankind has been loath to accept it 
as being really what it seems. The prevalence among 
practically all peoples of a belief in survival bears wit- 
ness to the revolt of human nature against its greatest 
enemy. What right have we to such a belief? Our wishes, 
however deep and strong, are not sufficient. That man 
should shrink with horror from the thought of annihi- 
lation may be for aught we know but another evidence 
that the world is run without reference to him, that 
he is in fact an interloper, a misfit. 

Only the briefest outline of the argument to set this 
pessimistic suggestion aside and to support the belief in 
survival can here be given, ‘There is, in fact, only one 
consideration that has any independent weight; all others 
are derived from this one. It is the evidence from ex- 
perience that the human self is of sufficient value in the 
eyes of the ultimate Source of our being to justify its 
continued existence. Our studies up to the present have 
tended to establish a high degree of plausibility for the 
following propositions. (1) “That God, being intelligent, 
has a plan for the universe, which justifies whatever hap- 
pens within it. (2) That God is unlimited in power, 
and therefore, so far as the merely physical is concerned, 
the time process does not mean that he must manipulate 


262 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


to gain his ends. The universe at any one moment is 
exactly what he wills it to be. Hence the world-process 
must have its raison d’étre in the realization of some end 
that involves incessant change. “The only aim that does 
involve the cosmic process and also justify it is the cul- 
ture of intelligences, the development of selves. ‘This, 
then, must be the goal of cosmic evolution. But we are 
not to infer that human personality is alone a sufficient 
goal. At most we may believe that human beings belong 
to the spiritual hierarchy for whose well-being the uni- 
verse exists. If, then, selves are of such value to God that 
he organizes his cosmic activities with reference to their 
nurture and unfolding, the inference seems permissible that 
when the period of apprenticeship in this life is ended, 
the self will enter upon another form of existence. 

At present there are those—as there always have been 
since man became critical and sophisticated—who decry 
a belief in immortality as selfish and cowardly. They 
do not consider all that is involved. This belief alone jus- 
tifies the moral ideal of self-realization; it alone solves 
the problem of evil and enables us to believe in a God 
that is good; it alone explains nature’s marvelous adapta- 
tions to the fostering of human life and well-being; it 
alone gives a worthy goal to the cosmic processes. The 
belief, then, in the continued existence of the human per- 
sonality after death can claim a high degree of proba- 
bility. 

It seems evident that all religious values depend for 
their validity upon the existence of a God who is perfect 
in power and goodness. He must realize in his character 
the highest ideal of the moral life, since ultimately noth- 
ing counts except his will. Philosophical considerations 
drawn from the universal aspects of experience and from 
those major issues of the intellectual life which we have 
been discussing tend to support a belief in such a God. 
There are, in addition, lines of evidence that appeal only 
to the deeply religious, and hence can be recognized by 
philosophy only with a definite understanding of their 


RELIGIOUS VALUES 263 


limitations. To the religiously minded who have made 
the great venture and staked their all on a belief in God 
as the supremely gracious all-wise Father, there comes 
an assuring response which as an inner experience of cer- 
titude abundantly satisfies the worshipper. The experi- 
ence is subjective, says the psychologist. But that does 
not disturb the devout worshipper, for to him the re- 
sponse is as real and objective as any communication 
from another person could be. He holds that his experi- 
ence of response can be tested in appropriate ways and 
that every test brings him further confirmation. He 
might point out also that, psychologically considered, 
all experiences are subjective. The only way, then, that 
one can escape solipsism is to discover an extra-subjective 
ground for the experiences. Just as the objective char- 
acter of the sense world is explained by reference to the 
common source of stimulation, so the religionist may 
claim, with some show of justice, that the sense of God’s 
presence and of his friendliness may have an objective 
source. But this line of thought would of itself have 
little value as evidence unless supported by many other 
considerations. It would then have a certain corrobora- 
tive force. 

The real question, as we have said, is not, Does God 
exist? but, Is God good and powerful enough to validate 
the implications of an ideal religious life? Every human 
being of average intelligence has a god in whom he be- 
lieves. ‘This is true even of those who make light of 
religion and repudiate religious beliefs. They discard the 
being we call God for a substitute of their own. We call 
them godless only because their worship of wealth or 
pleasure or the mechanical universe or “humanity’’ or 
themselves is so out of harmony with our own concep- 
tions. The theistic proofs do not refer to such gods. 
When, therefore, we ask, ‘““Does God exist?’ the relevant 
answer is the question, ‘“What God?”’ for there are many. 
Which one are we justified in accepting as our God? If 
our conception of him is to meet the test of experience, 


264 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


we must think of him as creating and maintaining the 
universe, and as making nature a fit place for the de- 
velopment and realization of personalities. Only such a 
concept can validate belief in religious values. 

Having previously touched upon the general nature 
of these values, we have now to consider them somewhat 
more closely. The greatest and most inclusive religious 
values are the following: (1) Religion promotes the 
integration of selfhood, and justifies the highest ideals 
of self-realization. (2) It furnishes a conception of 
society that meets our deepest needs as social beings. (3) 
It interprets life as codperation with God and makes pos- 
sible belief in prayer as a form of this codperation. 

First, let us consider the effect of religion on the in- 
tegration of the self. Selfhood is an ideal always in pro- 
cess of being realized. It comes into being gradually 
through the constant interplay of native impulses, or 
drives, and the environment. ‘The drives belong to the 
very constitution of the self and do not need conscious 
intelligence to call them into exercise. Nevertheless they 
become distinctively human only as they are brought 
under the control of conscious volition. On the plane of 
conscious selfhood, the will is the controlling power and 
determines the course of higher development. Hence 
whatever strengthens the will and gives it a worthy ob- 
ject contributes to the integration of the self. Religion 
does this in fullest measure. It is the supreme act of the 
self in taking over the highest values of life. Not only 
does it set the well-being of the self above all other values, 
but it encourages the self to find its abiding satisfactions 
in the ideal of a community wherein God is the great 
Socius, and all human beings are his children. Religion 
actually implies that God's interest in his human family 
is such that the physical universe is run with exclusive 
reference to the realization of such spiritual potencies as 
they might conceivably attain. No other influence can be 
so powerful in awakening dormant spiritual resources; 
none can so unify and strengthen the self. All that is 


RELIGIOUS VALUES 265 


suppressed or ignored in the distractions of daily work 
comes into rich expression in the exercise of religion. 
Worship begets confidence, a sense of security, a conscious- 
ness of being at home in God's world. These make for 
self-respect and spiritual vigor. The lesser values that 
cost such effort to acquire, the cares and anxieties inci- 
dent to the struggle for power, position and prestige, tend 
to fall away and give place to the assurance that, as God's 
own, we are already above the need of such things. 

At the same time religion creates in us the conviction 
that our supreme life-task is doing God’s will. His will 
is interpreted as meaning devotion to the highest ideals of 
service. Every principle of personal morality is thus reén- 
forced; zeal and loyalty are stimulated to the utmost. In 
a twofold sense, therefore, religion is a powerful integrat- 
ing force. It magnifies the values that exalt selfhood, and 
it furnishes an adequate life purpose. In adopting the life 
purpose that religion offers, we also escape that most dis- 
integrating influence, a sense of failure. To do God’s will 
is to succeed; this is the voice of religious confidence. 

Secondly, the religious ideal of society satisfies every re- 
quirement. Are we tired of war? Religion teaches that, 
as children of God, human beings are of infinite worth. 
Do we despair of economic justice, because selfishness seems 
to be the ruling motive in the business world? Religion 
counsels cooperation and mutual helpfulness. Are we de- 
pressed by the prevalence of crime, cruelty and social vice? 
Religion brings the utmost pressure to bear upon the in- 
dividual and society to turn from evil and learn to do 
good. ‘The religious ideal of society is that of an all-inclu- 
sive family. The good will, forbearance, and mutual 
helpfulness exemplified in the ideal family are in principle 
appropriate for the society that religion would realize. 
Overthrowing the rule of selfishness and greed, religion 
would establish the Kingdom of God, the ““Beloved Com- 
munity,’’ where each will work for the good of all. 

Thirdly, religion justifies belief in prayer as a form of 
cooperation with God. Prayer is the religious value that 


266 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


conditions all others; it is the summum bonum of the reli- 
gious life. If the worshipper were deprived of this priv- 
ilege, nothing would be left to him except magic; and 
magic has, at least formally, been repudiated by the mod- 
ern man. A haunting fear and dread would take the place 
of the confidence that a belief in prayer inspires. “True it 
is that many who do not pray in the ordinary sense are 
apparently free from this fear and dread. But prayer may 
range from conscious communion with God as Father 
down to the effectual conviction that obedience to natural 
laws will bring its appropriate results. Nowhere between 
these extremes can one draw the line and say, This is 
prayer, this is not. But the difference is great between the 
extremes of type. 

Belief in the objective efficacy of prayer is called in ques- 
tion by many. ‘The natural scientist is likely to hold 
that it contravenes the law of cause and effect, since it 
would accomplish results in nature without the use of 
natural means. ‘Jo the moralist it might well seem un- 
just, for it would give the suppliant an advantage over 
the person who honestly worked but did not pray. The 
psychologist might point out that all the phenomena of 
prayer are subjective throughout, beginning and ending in 
the psychic life. Finally the empirically minded might 
contend that the belief finds little if any support in ex- 
perience; many prayers as petitions are manifestly not an- 
swered, and the others may be explained as mere coinci- 
dences. “To maintain, therefore, that prayer brings its ap- 
propriate response not only in the subjective life but also 
in external nature is to risk one’s reputation for philo- 
sophic sobriety. [he importance of the issue justifies a 
brief statement of the rational grounds for a belief in 
prayer. 

Two misconceptions must be cleared away. One is the 
notion that through prayer a person may gain his own 
private will without reference to the well-being of his fel- 
lows. Manifestly such a notion runs counter to the con- 
ditions of a moral world-order and cannot be tolerated. 


RELIGIOUS VALUES 267 


It makes God partial, unduly favoring selfish but insistent 
piety. The other misconception is that law actually reigns 
in nature as an all-compelling ‘‘natural necessity,’’ deter- 
mining events and precluding other than physical influ- 
ences. But evidently law is not such a power; it merely 
expresses in a generalized and formal way the investiga- 
tor’s findings in his study of nature. 

Prayer begins with a sense of need. Whatever else 
prayer may include, its nerve is petition. It is as petition 
that prayer starts the question of objective efficacy. Peti- 
tion is a will attitude; it is something more than a wish. 
Wish prayers, however enlarged their borders, are sham 
prayers, just as wishes are abortive substitutes for volition. 
A voluntary act as ordinarily understood includes both a 
change of will attitude and a change in bodily functioning. 
We seem by an act of will to set free characteristic forms 
of energy that express themselves in bodily movement. 
But, strictly speaking, only the change in the inner life of 
the self can be reckoned as our part of the transaction. 
What follows in the external world, including the body, 
is the response of the ultimate Power in carrying out the 
volition. ‘The two factors, then, are the subjective appeal 
and the objective response. Nothing is contributed by 
the self except the suppliant attitude. The act of volition 
is a change of inner state and nothing more. The self 
may make the mistake of thinking that by its own power 
it manipulates nature; but when by analysis the facts be- 
come known, a volition is seen to be essentially petition. 
It is an appeal to the Power on which we depend. ‘The 
self wills, the Power executes. The response on the part 
of the Power is prompt and appropriate. ‘Thus all voli- 
tion is in a sense prayer, and prayer is volition. They 
both imply, in some degree, communion with the ultimate 
Power. 

Since both volition and prayer are changes in the atti- 
tude of the self toward the world of values, the conditions 
of success in volition and the conditions of success in 
prayer are essentially the same. The universe is of such a 


268 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


character that when a human being rightly wills a cer- 
tain good (that is, a desirable change in the environment), 
that good comes to pass. “The inevitableness of the result 
is impressive. Nature is our servant. “To the worshipper 
this means that God stands ever ready to carry out our 
wills, when we carry out the conditions. “These condi- 
tions are all moral, because we live in a moral world where 
good is obtained by request and only so. Need is felt, 
desire is awakened, a good is sought. The volition is in 
the seeking. “The response is conditioned on the character 
of the volition and the exigencies of the entire system to 
which the individual belongs. Whatever the response, it 
has to do with the bestowal of a good. ‘The great problem 
of the intellectual life is to find out what goods are on the 
whole desirable. The volition may fail to realize the spe- 
cific good sought, and yet not be wholly futile. Some re- 
sults always follow a genuine volition. It is evident, then, 
that the universe is infinitely sensitive to will attitudes. 
We are called upon to utilize this sensitivity to our profit. 

When we say that we live in a moral world, we mean 
that its all-explaining purpose is the perfecting of self- 
conscious beings.'* If, then, the needs of the moral life 
are the real determinants in the universe, every change in 
the moral attitude of any individual self must make a dif- 
ference felt everywhere. This is simply the teleological 
version of the doctrine that nature is a system—the slight- 
est change anywhere affects the whole. Since prayer in- 
volves a change in the moral attitude, it inevitably brings 
about its appropriate result. As a functioning of the self 
in willing, it releases energy and makes actual a situation 
not till then possible, because the moral conditions did not 
before exist. Not all prayer is successful as measured by 
the petition itself; so it is with volition generally. The 
universe as a whole is involved in every volition, and ihere- 
fore in every prayer. We can never be sure that we have 
met the conditions for obtaining just the goods we pray 


14 A fuller statement of the grounds for this conclusion will be 
found in Part IV, 


RELIGIOUS VALUES 269 


for—often this is a fortunate outcome. We seldom know 
how to pray as we ought. 

As prayer lifts volition to the consciously moral plane 
where the transactions are recognized to be between per- 
sons, the human and the divine, we may expect that the 
immediate enrichment of selfhood in prayer will be the 
most manifest result. Whatever changes may follow in 
the external world will rank as of secondary importance, 
even though in many cases they are far from negligible. 
This needs emphasis because we are immersed in the ex- 
perience of the world as physical rather than moral. The 
chief difficulty in understanding answer to prayer lies in 
getting an adequate conception of the moral significance of 
the external world. All physical change is subsidiary and 
instrumental to the development of selfhood. Hence all 
prayers that enrich the self, whether through nature or 
through spiritual contact with God, fulfil the inner pur- 
pose of all volition. Before praying we are more or less 
distraught, uncertain. [Through prayer we come con- 
sciously into the presence of God, and thereby get a new 
moral perspective. We see all values in the light of the 
whole. Little annoyances and vexations fall away, petty 
grievances no longer irritate, spiritual depression gives place 
to an inflowing joyousness, and we become strong for our 
tasks. Communion with God in prayer is the supreme 
experience of life. 

If we should pursue the subject further and ask, What 
are the specific conditions of success in prayer? philosophy 
could give only hints and suggestions. In general we may 
be fairly sure that the following conditions hold. (1) 
Prayer as genuine volition must enlist all our resources, 
physical and spiritual, to achieve the result. Only on this 
condition could we rightly expect codperation on the part 
of the ultimate power. The prayer, therefore, should be 
for something we consider intrinsically better than what 
we already have. When we are mistaken as to the desira- 
bility of the good we seek, we may not expect the answer 
to be in exact accord with the request. Our limitations of 


270 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


insight, on the one hand, and the cosmic character of the 
interests involved, on the other, make it necessary for the 
worshipper to pray in the spirit of the great petition, 
“Not my will, but thine, be done.’’ (2) The principle 
of preference among objectives should be that spiritual 
(social) goods are to be preferred to material (exclusive) 
goods. ‘This principle brings us into the heart of all sane 
religious experience. ‘Io be consciously in God’s presence, 
to yield our wills to him for guidance, brings spiritual 
peace and renewal. 

In the foregoing discussion of religious values a certain 
conception of God has been assumed. If this conception 
is untrue in essential features, the values identified as reli- 
gious are other than described or are altogether fictitious. 
One’s conception of religion depends on one’s conception 
of God. As that conception is the fruitage of one’s own 
experience, it must differ from period to period in one’s 
individual life. “The conception must differ also from 
age to age in the life of mankind. Yet certain universal 
elements change only in the sense that we become more ap- 
preciative of their scope and significance. or instance, 
it may be a question in the minds of some whether God is 
really infinite in wisdom, power, and goodness. The 
facts of experience do not immediately support such a con- 
clusion. Even after much pondering, with an open mind, 
sympathetic toward all that scientific and philosophical 
reflection may teach, we may still be at a loss to know how 
God’s power and his goodness can be reconciled. The 
practical necessity of harmonizing them and the intellec- 
tual difficulty of doing so furnish the occasion of an ever 
deepening insight into God's infinite nature. The issue 
here suggested will come up again for consideration when 
we study the self in its relation to the world. 

How are religious values related to cognitive, xsthetic, 
and moral values? A summary answer would be that in 
religious values all others culminate. But this needs a fur- 
ther word. Knowledge is not necessarily religious. Yet 
we can pass by insensible degrees from knowledge that 


RELIGIOUS VALUES Bail 


seems wholly secular to knowledge that is indubitably re- 
ligious. As soon as we enter the field of cognitive values 
we become logically committed to the idea of a world of 
values expressing the will of an intelligent Power. Sucha 
conclusion, if reached, would not be scientific knowledge, 
because it pertains to the problem of reality and that is the 
characteristic problem of philosophy. It is just as trust- 
worthy as scientific knowledge, due allowance being made 
for its greater scope and complexity. When once the stu- 
dent reaches the insight that he lives in a world charged 
with meaning and replete with values, he can find occa- 
sion for the awakening of the religious consciousness in 
his every experience. Progress in scientific knowledge 
might then only deepen and enrich this consciousness. 
The entire body of doctrine on which the religious life 
rests and from which it draws its nourishment is philo- 
sophical in character. The esthetic and moral values are 
just as profoundly related to the religious. “They seem to 
contrast with the religious in their lower ranges, but the 
differences grow less as we advance. An artistic produc- 
tion or a bit of nature may appear beautiful to a person 
who is not consciously religious. He may feel as if it 
were a long way to the experience that can be realized only 
in the presence of the great Spirit. But by a flash of in- 
sight the distance can be covered in a trice. Every form 
of beauty may induct the beholder into a religious atti- 
tude and reveal a religious quality. Religious values, then, 
are zsthetic values expressed in the highest ranges of expe- 
rience. The distinction between religious and moral values 
can apparently be sharply drawn. Moral values arise in 
everyday choices, as we try to get on in life. The moral 
judgments are valid in their own right; obligation to obey 
them rests on empirical knowledge of their worth as 
guides to the goods of life. Yet the moral choice encom- 
passes all the goods of which we are capable and especially 
the summum bonum. Hence the supremely moral choice 
is religious in character. From the religious point of view, 
all acts of life may express devotion to God’s will. A cup 


272 THE WORLD AS VALUE 


of water only may be given in his name. Religious ideals 
condition the moral life, and loyalty to them is a moral 
attitude. Nothing short of these religious ideals can fully 
justify the final authority of conscience; nothing else can 
reveal the scope and meaning of such principles as justice, 
honesty, benevolence. On the other hand, when religious 
beliefs are not up to the standard of moral insight, the 
effect is mischievous. ‘The moral test is final in religion 
as elsewhere. ‘This test is progressive, changing with in- 
crease of insight. “[he moral test is not really a limitation 
‘to the authority of religious beliefs: rather it is the only 
rational means of ascertaining what beliefs should have 
authority. When this test is applied, religion is morality 
at its best, informed by the consciousness of God’s ap- 
proval and help. Thus, while we may distinguish the 
various types of value, they blend in the highest experi- 
ences of life. 

Having briefly considered the world of values, we pass 
to the study of the self, the originator of value. 


PART IV 
THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


CHAPTER [ 
THE CENTRAL POSITION OF THE SELF IN PHILOSOPHY 


All distinctively philosophical problems have their ulti- 
mate solution in the self. Whatever the question asked of 
reality, its final answer must wait upon the principle of 
selfhood. This is the conclusion to which our studies 
have brought us. If it were generally recognized in con- 
temporary thinking, philosophy might enter upon a period 
of fruitful development, comparable to the great syn- 
thetic movement that signalized the early part of the nine- 
teenth century. [he time is ripe for such a development. 
Our knowledge of nature is massive and detailed, but who 
can furnish the organizing principle that will bring order 
into it? The generalizations within the basic sciences 
have carried forward the problem of organization to a 
point beyond which—except in matters of detail—science 
may not be able to go. At least the direction of such ad- 
vance within scientific limits is not evident. The prob- 
lem is one for philosophy to solve. Many have been the 
attempts both in the distant and the recent past. The dis- 
satisfaction with the prevalent type of idealism has been 
abundantly justified, and the drift toward some form of 
realism is a wholesome protest. Yet the realisms that 
have been offered have so completely failed to solve our 
elementary problems that they too are coming into disfa- 
vor. Under critical fire the realisms have moved more and 
more toward the characteristic doctrines of idealism. The 

273 


2/4 THETSEER INVES WORKED 


naive variety has passed over into the New Realism, and 
that in turn has found a vigorous rival in Critical Realism. 
The struggle is on; neither can maintain itself, because 
both are transitional types of thought. While the new 
realist’s independent object refuses altogether to connect 
with thought-content, the critical realist’s essences atom- 
istically conceived are forced to function not only for the 
complex independent real, but for the content of sense per- 
ception, for the universal element in thought, and, it 
would seem, for the thinker himself who weighs and con- 
siders and blunders and concludes to a reality he affirms 
but cannot know. It is high time that realism take the 
next step and become personalistic.t Its riddles would 
then be resolved, its incoherences adjusted, and its line of 
advance made clear and definite. 

But we cannot hope that this next step will be taken 
by contemporary thinkers except under logical compul- 
sion. Every possible substitute for the self as the explain- 
ing principle must be tested to the limit, and every miscon- 
ception of the self must be removed. This shying from 
the self as the central issue and ultimate key in philosophy 
can easily be understood. ‘The self is the most intimate 
fact in our experience and therefore can most easily be ig- 
nored in favor of the less familiar. “The self, always pres- 
ent, becomes elusive. We sally forth from ourselves into 
the world of experience; we choose to live among the self’s 
creations, where the self cannot of course be found. We 
look within and we look without, the self is not there. 
The closest scrutiny fails to reveal anything anywhere 
other than mental states, sensa, more or less connected in 
consciousness. The propensity to look away from the 
self is encouraged not only by the practical needs of con- 
tinuous adjustment to the outside world, but by the fond 
conviction that thought must find solution for life’s prob- 
lems in terms of thought. Since all thought is abstract, 
its utmost reach must be some such comprehensive abstrac- 
tion as force, idea, system, experience, absolute. Further- 


1Cf, J. E. Turner, A Theory of Direct Realism, chap. xxii. 


CEN RAI POS AON: OFTHE PSELEW 275 


more when we think we know the self and try to use it, 
we are likely to be confounded, for the self cannot define 
itself. It has no bounds; it seems but the nebulous back- 
ground of its activities and, as such, a hazy blending of 
contradictions and confusions, at one moment identified 
with the totality of its passing experiences and the next 
moment with another totality of experience. Now if the 
self is to prove adequate as a principle of universal expla- 
nation, it must meet apparently conflicting requirements. 
It must apparently be as complex as the whole universe of 
thought while it remains the ultimately simple and uni- 
tary. If the self does not contain the complexity to be 
explained, how can it adequately explain? But if it does 
contain the complexity, how can it be thought as simple 
and unitary? ‘This difficulty we shall have to face when 
we come to consider the nature of the self. We shall then 
argue that the difficulty vanishes when we distinguish the 
unitary self from its experiences. 

The great lesson that the history of philosophy teaches 
with the emphasis of repetition is the fragmentary char- 
acter of all world-views that ignore the central position of 
the self. Generations of thinkers have explored the field 
of thought to find the ultimate principle of explanation. 
May not this principle be the idea of a universal persistent 
force that acts unconsciously? May we not find the prin- 
ciple in the conception of a pure self-regulative mechan- 
ism? May not experience itself, all-inclusive and per- 
fectly exemplifying the law of consistency, be the key to 
nature’s secret? ‘These are among the suggestions most 
frequently followed by those who turn away from the 
principle of selfhood. ‘They all make a strong appeal and 
promise much; but they all fall short and in the end leave 
the mind bewildered. ‘The assertion that force persists in 
nature adds nothing to the experienced fact that nature 
continues active. As blind or unconscious this hypothett- 
cal force does not even suggest an explanation of orderli- 
ness in nature. When the attempt is made to save the 
theory by referring the force and its orderly persistence to 


276 THE SELBMNITT SO WORKD 


a cosmic unknowable, its failure as explanation is com- 
plete. The theory that the world with everything in it 
constitutes a perfect self-regulating mechanism emphasizes 
the universal presence of order, but does not explain it. 
When elaborated this theory is merely a description of gen- 
eralized experience. It leaves the question open as to the 
nature of the power that causes the world to be what it 
is from moment to moment. More important still from 
the standpoint of explanation, it leaves the presence of 
selves in the midst of nature an opaque mystery. Philos- 
ophy must advance beyond mere description or surrender 
its prerogatives and leave the field entirely to the natural 
sciences. Finally the theory that reality is experience 
states the problem in a suggestive way. To recognize the 
self as the implied experient seems inevitable. “The golden 
key is in our hands. But are we sure that this is true? 
‘The fact that down through the ages thinkers have sought 
some “‘new way of ideas’ in which selfhood, if recognized 
at all, is made to play a subordinate part, points both to 
inherent difficulties in the notion of selfhood and to pos- 
sible weaknesses in its explaining power. These difficul- 
ties must be met. Our course will be (1) to consider 
briefly how the self has figured in every insight that we 
have reached up to this point; (2) to pass in review the 
more typical conceptions of selfhood in recent thought; 
(3) to endeavor in the light of all available material to 
formulate a conception of the self that will satisfy. Out 
of this discussion will arise certain questions that will need 
to be considered before our task is done. 

For the sake of brevity we may gather up the issues 
thus far considered into three closely related problems. 
The first is the problem of permanence and change. While 
this is in a sense inclusive of all other philosophical issues, 
it has special reference to sense perception. “The second is 
the problem of order as central in the field of elaborated 
or scientific knowledge. “The third is the problem of value 
as objectively real. 

As regards the first problem, we saw that change is un- 


BEN TALE OsL DION OR PHE SELPE 5°27:7 


thinkable without a permanent entity that changes, and 
we recognized too that change is not easily thinkable with 
such an entity. [he difficulty is twofold. We must pro- 
vide the permanent element, and then read change into it 
without destroying its permanence. Now the ultimate 
assumption on which the possibility of sense experience 
rests is that the stimulations which constitute the ante- 
cedents of perception come in continuous succession, each 
passing out as its successor comes into being. To indicate 
this process we must use the term succession, but if our 
thought is clear we shall refrain from reading into this se- 
quence any of that synthetic activity of the mind whereby 
the succession becomes a succession for us. In and for it- 
self the only portion of the succession that could at any 
time exist would be the content of the individual instant, 
unthinkably short, that might be called a present if it 
lasted long enough to be named. ‘The activity of the self 
in apprehending the succession as such then becomes evi- 
dent. The self alone can furnish the permanent impli- 
cate; it alone can weave the distinguishable features into 
a temporal series. But even a succession is not yet change. 
In order that we should have an experience of change, the 
self must formulate a law of sequence and give to this 
law a substantial basis. As much as this is an absolute 
minimum of mental activity in apprehending change, and 
this implies a self as the agent. 

One can easily criticize the procedure whereby we get 
our world of permanent, quasi independent things with 
changing states. ‘Ihe integrity of the thing seems to be 
seriously threatened by successive states, and the manifold- 
ness of the states seems inconsistent with the unity of the 
thing. But to exhibit the apparent contradiction between 
these two aspects of change is not to set aside the evidence 
they furnish for the presence and activity of the self in 
this most elementary experience. Until we find a some- 
thing other than a self that can provide for the experienced 
succession, without becoming itself a mere succession, and 
also provide for the permanent element in change without 


278 THE SELF IN?ITS WORED 


becoming a mere changeless, inert pseudo-entity—until we 
can find a not-self that can perform these two unique 
functions, we have no recourse but either to affirm the 
reality of the self as the implication of all experience or to 
confess that we are unable to construe the most elementary 
fact of experience, the fact of change. Eliminate the self as 
the constructive reality in experience, and you cannot 
take the first step toward understanding the possibility of 
any experience whatever. “The whole battle for the exist- 
ence of the self can be fought out at this point. Sense per- 
ception is the arena where the self first makes its presence 
decisively felt. Further study may reveal other forms of 
its activity and help to determine its true character, but the 
additional evidence for its existence will simply corrobo- 
rate a belief already securely established. 

Order, the second problem, involves the first. The 
sense world begins in a welter of incipient experiences 
(sense data, impressions, the thought-distinguished begin- 
nings of reaction to stimulations). “These are not yet an 
ordered world. ‘They are evanescent and so various one 
from another that no two can be considered exact dupli- 
cates. Out of this chaos, the self constructs a more or less 
articulated cosmos. We know in general how this is done. 
Everywhere we find the self fixating, selecting, modifying, 
arranging, as it imposes order upon its world. ‘The result 
is science in all its glory. So regnant is the self in this 
world-building enterprise, that it does not hesitate on oc- 
casion to substitute its own construction, its tissue of con- 
cepts, for what might otherwise seem to be the unmodified 
objective reality. Naive sense perception suffers many a 
transformation at the hands of scientists in their summary 
manipulation to make the sense world square with the de- 
mands of intelligence. We consent to this treatment of 
our spontaneous views of nature because we believe that 
it leads to the truth. In accordance with the laws of right 
thinking, this intellectual fabrication is worked over till 
it becomes thoroughly trustworthy—the only reality that 
for practical purposes the self needs to recognize. Nothing 


CENTRAD POSITION: OF THE SELF. 279 


seems real that cannot be somehow fitted into this estab- 
lished order. Only by obedience thereto can we make the 
necessary adjustments to the Power not ourselves, which 
is the ultimate Source of objective order. This Power 
must be thought as an ultimate Self if it is to function ade- 
quately as a co-worker in the construction of our cosmic 
world and explain that world’s knowability. True, the 
world is set in order by us, yet it must be susceptible of 
ordering, else our manipulations would result in confusion. 

Nowhere in nature is there any evidence of inherent dis- 
order or faultiness of construction. When a student of 
nature comes face to face with what seems to him a con- 
dition of chaos, he looks upon it as simply a problem in 
scientific analysis and is confident that when fully under- 
stood the chaos will be resolved into perfect order and har- 
mony. It takes a self to resolve a seeming chaos, and just 
as truly it implies an ultimate Self to codperate with the 
finite knower in originating a world capable of being set 
in order. So readily and instantaneously does the ultimate 
Source respond to the practical demand for order, that we 
are not directly aware that any response is involved. Since 
orderliness is the deepest need of our nature as intellectual 
beings, orderly response to the world of stimulations is 
the primary expression of selfhood. The ultimate Power 
is the perfect Self, and we are miniature models thereof. 
Something of what such a conclusion means will be sug- 
gested later. 

Our discussions thus far would seem to warrant us in 
concluding that the universe consists of nothing other than 
selves and their interrelated activities. “his conclusion is 
sO sweeping, so opposed to the Zeitgeist, and so significant 
that it will need to face every possible criticism before it 
can be considered as finally established. But we may hold 
it provisionally, and await the further development of our 
subject. 

The third problem, namely, value, can hardly be stated 
without directly implying the evaluating self. “Those who 
would develop a doctrine of value without explicit refer- 


280 THE) SELEVINGIS WORE 


ence to the self have in mind a scientific treatment of the 
subject. Such a treatment is confessedly abstract. It con- 
sists of the analysis and classification of values with a view 
to their organization into a system. ‘That this mode of 
treatment should yield much insight and usable knowl- 
edge is what we might expect; but that it succeeds in elim- 
inating the self as the source of values is not in any way 
supported by the evidence. It means that, like all thought- 
content, values can be treated objectively. Yet when the 
question of origins is raised, the necessity of assuming the 
self becomes manifest. Values then originate in the self 
and exist only for a self. “Their objective reality follows 
from the conclusion that they are a part of the self’s re- 
sponse to stimulations. ‘The self is the judge of what the 
values are and of their relative significance. “The self’s ca- 
pacities and limitations determine what shall be consid- 
ered true or beautiful or good. ‘The self with its needs 
and capacities for development can satisfy the condition 
of a summum bonum as the adequate basis of a moral life. 
The possibilities of the self’s development and its intrinsic 
worth are the sole ground for a rational belief in the per- 
manence and augmentation of the higher social values. 
Finally the complete realization of selfhood is the only 
goal of cosmic evolution that does not leave us groping 
among impossible expedients. Why, then, do so many 
contemporary thinkers fail to appreciate the real signifi- 
cance of the self? “There seems to be no other explanation 
than the persistence of the objective point of view. When 
the present fashion passes, the self will come into its own. 


CHAPTER II 


CONTEMPORARY THEORIES OF THE SELF 


In reviewing contemporary theories of the self, we shall 
find it helpful to go back for our starting point to the time 
when the two main schools of modern thought were in 
sharpest contrast and most certain of themselves. One of 
these schools has throughout most of its history been 
known as English Empiricism. It reached its culmination 
a century and a half ago in the writings of David Hume. 
The other school has, by way of contrast, but more or 
less inaccurately, been called German Idealism. It passed 
its greatest crisis and entered upon a period of fruitful de- 
velopment in the speculations of Immanuel Kant. While 
these two schools have remained fairly distinct and are 
still of service for purposes of classification, they have, 
under the stress of mutual criticism, persistently ap- 
proached each other, much to the advantage of true in- 
sight. As our study is not primarily historical, a very 
brief reference to the theories of the earlier masters will 
suffice. 

Hume was typically British in his devotion to the em- 
pirical point of view and his relative indifference to spec- 
ulation. Starting with the assumption that the mind re- 
ceived its material from without in the form of what he 
called impressions (more accurately nowadays called sense 
data or sensa), and that these were atomic in structure, he 
came to the conclusion that the self was an arena or the- 
atre where the impressions appeared, combined, and van- 
ished. As the arena or theatre did nothing to the im- 
pressions, it served only as a verbal convenience. Essen- 
tially the self was for Hume a succession of impressions 

28] 


282 THE SELPUIN TT SewWOeRLD 


or mental states. [his is expressly declared in the oft- 
quoted passage from A Treatise of Human Nature: ‘‘When 
I enter most intimately into what I call myself, I always 
stumble on some particular perception or other, of heat 
or cold, light or shade, love or hatred, pain or pleasure. 
I never can catch myself at any time without a perception, 
and never can observe anything but the perception. When 
my perceptions are remov'd for any time, as by sound 
sleep; so long am I insensible of myself, and may truly 
be said not to exist.’’* A little farther on in the same 
section he says of individuals: ‘They are nothing but 
a bundle or collection of different perceptions, which 
succeed each other with an inconceivable rapidity, and are 
in a perpetual flux and movement. . . . The mind is a 
kind of theatre, where several perceptions successively 
make their appearance; pass, re-pass, glide away, and 
mingle in an infinite variety of postures and situations.” 
This seems from one point of view rather naive. Hume 
is the self who examines his perceptions and does not find 
himself among them. When he concludes that the self 
is only the ‘‘theatre’’ where the mental states appear, he 
seems to simplify the problem of perception by making 
it a question merely of the succession of these states. No 
wonder that in developing his doctrine, Hume faces mani- 
fest inconsistency. He can neither renounce nor reconcile 
the following principles, namely, “‘that all our distinct 
perceptions are distinct existences, and that the mind never 
perceives any real connection among distinct existences.’ 
The difficulty, as he confesses, is too hard for his under- 
standing. But evidently, the difficulty is of his own 
making. Having discarded the self as active, he was 
compelled to look upon the mental states (‘“‘perceptions’’) 
as isolated. “They were isolated when they arrived at the 
‘theatre,’ and nothing:there could connect them. Yet 
connected they were, both as being parts of one experi- 
ence and as constituting an objective world of interrelated 


1V ol) 1. pt. iv, 96, 
2 Op. cit., Appendix. 


CONTEMPORARY THEORIES 283 


things. To deny connection would have been equivalent 
to denying the possibility of knowledge. Hume could 
hardly have given a more convincing exhibition of the 
decisive role of the self in knowledge than in his argument 
for eliminating the self or reducing it to a passive some- 
what that could be entirely ignored. One is reminded of 
Emerson’s words: 


““They reckon ill who leave me out: 
When me they fly, I am the wings.” 


But Hume's embarrassment was not merely that he 
failed to find a metaphysical entity distinct from the flow 
of mental states, but that when he would give an account 
of the empirical ego (what psychologists generally de- 
nominate ‘“‘consciousness’’), he found it utterly elusive. 
The empirical ego comes and goes, it hovers about the 
experiences as a vague, intangible addition, doing nothing 
and yet somehow present during our waking moments. 
It seems accentuated whenever we become strenuous for 
the accomplishment of a purpose; then during times of 
relaxation and day-dreaming it may fade almost to the 
vanishing point. “That point is reached when sleep over- 
takes us or we become unconscious. When, therefore, 
Hume tried to answer with scientific precision the ques- 
tion, What is the self as experienced? he was baffled by 
finding that the object of his thought always turned out 
to be a mental state and nothing more. 

No material advance upon Hume has been made since 
his day by his followers except to make more definite 
and precise the nature of the difficulties that lurk in the 
problem of the self. “Those who have thought little about 
the problem know the self as a matter of course. Only 
the insistent thinkers discover .the complexity of the prob- 
lem and the apparently hopeless outlook for a solution. 
The Humian school of thought has made some progress 
by going outside the range of empiricistic principles and 
recognizing the distinction between the elusive self of 
experience—the self that the psychologist would make 


284 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


the object of analysis—and the self that is presupposed 
in any thoroughgoing theory of knowledge and reality. 
The self of the psychologist is the empirical ego and 
remains and must always remain for empiricism a mere 
problem. Science can never be satisfied with an empirical 
self that cannot be analyzed. Philosophy, on the other 
hand, must have a self that transcends experience and that 
cannot be wholly experienced because it is the presupposi- 
tion of experience—it makes experience possible. We can 
therefore appreciate the interplay in later empirical thought 
of these two conceptions—the self as empirically appre- 
hended and the self as implied in the very possibility of 
knowledge. We see this intermingling in the writings of 
W. K. Clifford. He would give greater concreteness to 
the idea of the self without acknowledging its inherent 
power to produce results. Why, he reasons, might not 
the self be thought after the general analogy of material 
things? Just as things are compounded out of indefinitely 
small particles, so the self or soul might be thought as 
made of minute elements which could appropriately be 
called ‘‘mindstuff.’’® 


The theory bears testimony to the necessity of reckon- 
ing with the self, even while denying its essential nature. 
But Clifford's appeal to hypothetical bits of spirituality, 
of which we know nothing, to explain the self that we 
know, is not worthy of much consideration. A contem- 
porary of his, Hodgson, would find a place for the self 
in an extra-phenomenal realm, yet deny to it any power 
to effect changes in actual experience. After making the 
usual assumption that the reality of selfhood is conscious- 
ness he speaks of consciousness as ‘‘a mere foam, aura, or 
melody arising from the brain but without reaction upon 
it.”’* He calls this entity an ‘“‘epiphenomenon.’’ ‘The 
conception itself is a philosophical curiosity. It has a 
passing interest for us, but only as illustrating again the 


3 Lectures and Essays, p. 284 ff.; cf. E. Haeckel on cell-souls, The 
Riddle of the Universe, pp. 88-130. 


4 Time and Space, p. 279. 


CONTEMPORARY THEORIES 285 


futile effort to find the self in its world, among its own 
constructions. Hodgson’s reasoning, reduced to its lowest 
terms, seems crude. ‘To deny outright the existence of 
the self would not do; but what exactly could it be? He 
could not find it among outside objects; it must be re- 
vealed in consciousness. Consciousness, then, expresses 
the essential nature of the self. But consciousness is less 
than the least phenomenon, though every phenomenon is 
somehow impregnated with it. To call it an epiphenom- 
enon would seem to do it ample justice. Our only com- 
ment is that such a self could not be even an aura; it 
would wholly vanish into process. 


Empiricism has its defenders in America. The most 
illustrious, if not the most thoroughgoing, has been 
William James. In justice to James, we need to distin- 
guish his earlier from his later attitude toward selfhood. 
His earlier interest was predominantly scientific, hence he 
inclined to reduce the self, after the manner of Hume, to 
a “‘stream of thoughts’ or a ‘‘stream of consciousness.’’® 
Manifestly the term “‘stream’’ like the term ‘‘succession’”’ 
or ‘‘bundle’”’ or “‘theatre’’ really contains the problem. Is 
the stream anything distinct from the individual states? 
James answers this question from the scientific standpoint 
in his essay, “‘Does ‘Consciousness’ Exist?’’ His answer 
is an emphatic, No. What is called consciousness con- 
sists, for him, of certain bodily functionings. ‘“The ‘I 
think’ which Kant said must be able to accompany all my 
objects is the ‘I breathe’ which actually does accompany 
them.’’® As science, this rather startling conclusion is 
entirely legitimate. ‘The ‘‘I’’ is as much in the breathing 
as in the thinking. One can observe the breathing, but 
who ever saw or handled a thought? “Thoughts as such 
do exist, however, even for James, and can be studied 
indirectly through the physical manifestations. In them- 


5 Principles of Psychology, vol. 1. p. 401 ff; Psychology, Briefer 
Course, p. 467 f. 

6 Journal of Philosophy, Psychology, and Scientific Method, vol. i. 
pp. 477-491. 


286 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


selves the thoughts are essentially disparate, yet are con- 
nected after a fashion by their ‘‘fringes.’’ When in his 
later work he faced the question whether a unitary abiding 
self was presupposed in psychic activity, he stoutly de- 
clared that “‘the thoughts themselves are the thinkers.’’* 
This paradox may seem absurd, but it is good science. 
That is, it is as far as science needs to go in dealing with 
the question. The limitations of the scientific viewpoint, 
however, are clearly recognized by James, as is evidenced 
by his closing words in discussing so-called “‘scientific 
psychology.’’ He says: ‘* ‘Psychology as a natural science’ 

means a psychology particularly fragile, and into 
which the waters of metaphysical criticism leak at every 
joint, a psychology all of whose elementary assumptions 
and data must be reconsidered in wider connections and 
translated into other terms.’’* James’s contribution to 
the question of the self was only preliminary. He showed 
in a striking way the necessity of transcending his own 
position if one is to come into the light where the self 
can be found. 


Henri Bergson, the William James of contemporary 
France, approaches the question of the self from a slightly 
different angle. His primary interest has heretofore been 
in reinterpreting the general doctrine of evolution as a 
process in which change is all-pervasive and thorough- 
going. As he understands evolution, it is not mechanical, 
for a mechanism works with static (i.e. unchanging) 
elements which can do nothing but submit to shiftings 
and permutations. Genuine evolution is creative, a process 
in which the absolutely new comes moment by moment 
into being. ‘The driving force, supposed by Bergson to 
account for this continuous appearing and disappearing, 
he calls the vital impetus (l’élan vital). In his popular 
work, Creative Evolution, he describes how this élan 
operates. ‘The reality, then, in the cosmic flow is an 
energy or force. Inasmuch as it continues throughout 


7 Briefer Course, p. 216. 
8 Ibid., p. 467 f. 


CONTEMPORARY THEORIES 287 


the process, he calls it duration (la durée); and because it 
is supposed to carry with it its own past and to push its 
way into the future, he thinks of it as a sort of conscious- 
ness. When it breaks up into individual manifestations 
and has to adjust itself to the assumed entity called matter, 
it may rise to an awareness of itself; it may become self- 
conscious.°® 


To do justice to Bergson’s thought would be difficult 
without extensive quotation and also without a discussion 
of his psychological prepossessions. He is primarily a 
psychologist with phiiosophical interests. In turning 
away from the old mechanistic type of explanation in 
favor of a form of vitalism, he is able to do fuller justice 
to mind or selfhood. A source of difficulty in understand- 
ing him arises from his ignoring the distinction on which 
we have insisted between the strictly scientific and the 
subjective or epistemic method of approach. Hence there 
is abundant opportunity to misread his thought. He 
speaks of the individual mind as an energy, of the indi- 
vidual consciousness as pure creativity, and of subjective 
time as pure inventiveness. Yet his exposition of these 
ideas is generally so objective that the self seems to suffer 
eclipse. Consciousness (which he equates both with life 
and with soul) becomes for him a rivulet of the stream 
of life, a passageway for the élan, a mere tendency.*° He 
comes nearer to a philosophical conception of the self as 
consciousness when he identifies it with duration, But 
to get his full meaning we must read a great deal into this 
term. Duration means the enduring, that which remains 
itself while ceaselessly manifesting the new and unique. 
One of the most important and significant capacities of the 
self is its power to persist through time and retain in mem- 
ory its own past. Duration is a suggestive term to apply 
to this characteristic, but it is susceptible of different inter- 
pretations according to the point of view. For science 


® Creative Evolution, pp. 4, 261 ff., 270, 312 f.: Matter and 
Memory, chap. iv. 
10 Cf, Bergson, Mind-Energy, trans, by H. W. Carr, i., ii. 


288 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


it may mean mere observed continuity, whereas for phil- 
osophy it may mean not only that the self creates its 
past but is profoundly affected by it. Bergson is so pre- 
occupied with his task of describing the cosmic process 
that he does not stop to consider the implications of his 
chance references to the self or mind. We seem to get 
fairly near to his thought of the self when we look upon 
it as a medium or channel (‘‘canal’’) through which the 
cosmic power reaches opposing matter. [his power, one 
in nature but many in manifestations, is the source of all 
energy, all will, all freedom. But it is fairly evident that 
up to the present time Bergson’s interests have not yet led 
him to give an unambiguous and satisfactory account of 
selfhood, though he has thrown light on most of the 
problems involved. The great favor with which his 
general view of the mental life has been received seems to 
come from the impression that his brilliantly figurative 
language half conceals and half reveals some new thing. 
But in order to be sure that we understand him, we must 
wait until he expresses himself more fully and _ less 
ambiguously. 


The lower limit of empiricistic thought concerning the 
self appears in Woodbridge’s contention that “‘conscious- 
ness is only a form of connection of objects, a relation 
between them.’’*! In thus transferring consciousness from 
the subjective to the objective realm, and making it a 
relation among things, he has but followed the logic of 
the scientific or objective method. ‘The reasoning is pat- 
ent. Consciousness is not a mere nonentity; and yet 
what is not an object is nothing whatever. Hence con- 
sciousness, being pervasive and not identifiable with any 
particular thing, must be a form of relation among things. 
One would like to doubt that Woodbridge really means 
to equate the self with consciousness, but the objective 
method of treatment leaves him no alternative. It is 
strangely true that a writer may be deeply conversant 


11 Journal of Philosophy, Psychology, and Scientific Method, vol. 
ji. pp. 119-125, 


CONTEMPORARY ‘THEORIES 289 


with every known aspect of the self’s activity, and yet, 
when facing the question, What is the self? have little 
to say that is not misleading. Such a writer may plausi- 
bly argue that as consciousness is the empirically known 
essence of selfhood, and as the self’s activity consists 
largely of contacts and reactions upon the external world, 
consciousness, and therefore selfhood, is nothing other 
than a feature of the physical environment. But the reply 
is near at hand that consciousness is simply the state of 
being conscious and is not in any sense an essence. As a 
state it implies a self that is conscious. Evidently, then, 
the discussion whether consciousness exists is irrelevant, 
when we seek to know the reality of the self. “This seems 
to close the discussion with the empiricist; yet he may 
reply that the self apart from consciousness, just as the 
self apart from the body, is a pure abstraction. We freely 
grant this contention. As we shall later have occasion 
to maintain, the self without a body is nothing at all; 
the two are indissoluble, yet neither is the other. Like- 
wise the self that never attained to consciousness could not 
be known as a self. Nevertheless just as the self is not its 
physical manifestation, so it is more than consciousness, 
even when we include under the term what psychologists 
call the subconscious. [he term thus broadened might 
include all the activities of the self and still the self would 
remain distinct from its activities. 

Current discussions in the various schools of psychol- 
ogy continue the empiricist controversies and furnish addi- 
tional evidence that the self from a scientific point of view 
is the most elusive thing in the whole range of human 
thought. This is quite as we might have anticipated. 
The structuralist analyzes the psychic content into sen- 
sations or sensa (ambiguity lurks in both terms), which 
have a fairly constant character and constitute the ulti- 
mately real entities of the mental life. The difficulty in 
building up the more complex features of psychic experi- 
ence, including the empirical self, out of sensations is only 
partly concealed by the ability of the structuralist himself 


290 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


to supply ab extra the needful connections and transforma- 
tions. As the simplest experience of the external world 
is a perception and not a sensation, all the manipulations 
of the hypothetical sensations below the perceptive plane 
are pure fictions. Each step of advance beyond the stage 
of elementary perceptions requires further modification 
of the supposed data, and at each stage we have new unities 
that, when taken apart, lose their distinctive character. 
Thus in the end, when the question is raised, How have 
all these manifold unities called thoughts, feelings, cona- 
tions come to be and what do they presuppose? the answer 
that they are compounded of elements called sensations 
and that they presuppose only those elements, seems 
absurdly inadequate. Whatever value for science may 
accrue from the careful observation and analysis of the 
relatively stable aspects of the psychic life, that life as- 
suredly does not consist of elements or states but of the 
continuously changing activities of a self. 

The behaviorist, realizing some of the difficulties en- 
countered in the structuralist’s account of the mental life 
and the impossibility of finding a place in that life for a 
‘transcendent self,’’ has broken away entirely from the 
idea not only of selfhood but of mental states. He con- 
tends that the facts of experience are all physical reactions 
to stimulations. No development in psychology is more 
interesting to the student of selfhood than this growing 
and aggressive school of behaviorists. “They employ psy- 
chological terms, but they deal exclusively in physical 
concepts. No wonder that some of their leaders are begin- 
ning to question if their science should longer be called 
psychology. Their béte noire is consciousness, for it 
obstinately refuses to be reduced to any form of mere 
physical manifestation. 

The functionalist can make out a far better case than 
either the structuralist or the behaviorist, though function 
may be interpreted in a purely mechanistic way. The 
theory then passes over into behaviorism. But it does not 
need to be so interpreted, nor is it, by the leaders gen- 


CONTEMPORARY ‘THEORIES Dol 


erally. It may mean that function not only implies or- 
ganization of inherited tendencies and aptitudes, but that 
what responds to the stimulations is an entity with char- 
acteristic capacities and needs, and that the responses are 
not necessarily mechanical, but may have reference to ends, 
may be teleological. Even instinctive responses (if we are 
still permitted to use that question-begging term) point 
to a future more or less anticipated subconsciously. But 
where functionalism advances beyond its competitors, it 
is throughout interpretation, and as such, of the nature 
of philosophy. ‘This intermingling of interpretation with 
description suggests that no psychology can complete 
itself short of a philosophy of life. The variants from 
these three types of psychological thought need not de- 
tain us. 


Turning now from the empiricistic treatment of our 
problem to the rationalistic, as exemplified by Kant and 
his successors, we seem to enter a different world. Kant, 
instead of assuming that our ideas come from without, 
argued that nothing is given except an undefined ‘‘mani- 
fold of sense’’ which the mind works over into objects. 
He approached the problem of knowledge by asking what 
is involved in its possibility. This led him to appreciate 
and defend the “‘subjective’’ point of view. He saw 
clearly that a fundamental unity (‘‘the original unity of 
consciousness,’ as he called it) must be assumed as the 
source of all the synthetic activity in the experience of 
knowing. In connection with this epochal insight he 
contended that the self as known (‘‘the synthetic unity,” 
or better, “‘the unity attained through synthesis’) is a 
mental construction and as such must be phenomenal. 
By this he meant that through the intellect alone (‘‘the 
theoretical reason’’) the self can be known only as an 
object.12. But later in his ethical writings he develops the 
theory that in being ethical or self-legislative, the self is 
an agent, having noumenal reality. In so far as ethical 


12 Critique of Pure Reason, A, p. 321 ff. 


BOW WHE SELB UING DUS SWORD 


it is free, and as free or “‘autonomous,”’ it is of infinite 
worth, having an immortal destiny.1* Whatever one may 
think of Kant’s reasoning whereby he arrived at these 
conclusions, the conclusions themselves can be brought 
into harmony with the ripest thought of the present day 
if they are reinterpreted in the light of recent developments 
in psychology, biology, and other sciences. 

Kant’s greatest successor in the study of selfhood was 
Hegel. He undertook to show that the universe of knowl- 
edge is so constituted that no concept concerning it 1s 
adequate to explain its nature. He argued that every 
concept, being abstract, has a limited application and 
range of meaning, so that whenever we stop in our con- 
ceptual thinking we are made to realize that a universe 
lies outside its compass. [hus if we try to rest in the 
thought of “‘being’’ as the final, all-encompassing cate- 
gory, we find pure being is pure emptiness. It can take 
on significance only as it passes over into ‘‘manifestation.”’ 
But both being and manifestation point to something 
other than themselves. “Taken separately, they are devoid 
of content. What is true of these representative concepts 
is true of all. But to appreciate the cogency of Hegel's 
reasoning, we should not make the mistake of reading 
into the concept more than its intellectual character will 
permit. Being as a concept does not mean an object that 
has being, and manifestation as a concept does not mean a 
thing manifested. “The concept must be taken in its utter 
abstractness. Reality then is more and other than con- 
cept, more and other than any form of intellectual content. 
All concepts as such pertain either to an implied reality 
as the source of experience or to the phenomenal manifes- 
tation as revealing a reality. No concept can include both 
being and manifestation. So long as we remain in the 
conceptual realm, being can be only being, and manifes- 
tation, manifestation; neither can be the other. 

This may at first seem to be little more than a quibble, 


13 Kant, Theory of Ethics, trans. by Abbott, pp. 65 ff., 218 ff., 
240 ff. 


CONTEMPORARY ‘THEORIES Loo 


but in fact it is a difficulty of the first order when we 
try to make our intellectual world explain itself. This is 
the most fruitful insight in all Hegelian philosophy. While 
it was implicit in Kant and others, it was brought by 
Hegel into the light of logical inevitableness, so that no 
one after him could ignore his demonstration and be 
philosophically up to date. Many since Hegel, even a 
large element of his own followers, have chosen to ignore 
this insight, but in every case the result has been the recur- 
rence of the same insurmountable difficulties in their phil- 
osophical thinking. If concepts as such are incapable of 
encompassing reality in its concreteness, how can we grasp 
reality as it is? As a matter of fact, we experience no 
embarrassment in combining abstract being and abstract 
manifestation. The difficulty is in separating them. How 
can we combine them if not conceptually? Not by first 
thinking being in the abstract and then manifestation in 
the abstract, and somehow uniting them. They are 
always experienced together. [he inadequacy of the 
concept to express the essence of reality only means that 
reality is something extra-intellectual, something of the 
nature of an agent, a power that can act without losing 
itself in its activity, a self that can have experiences and 
modify them after a pattern of its own. When this 
insight is mastered, the impossibility of the world’s being 
mere system, process, or impersonal energy, is demon- 
strated. Only a self can remain itself while having expe- 
riences of a world, a not-self. But Hegel did not call 
this power that could maintain itself in its activity a self; 
he used the Platonic term “‘Idea.’’ ‘This term suggests 
that Hegel remained to the last in the intellectual realm. 
But in the third part of his Logic, in which he treats of 
the concepts of the Notion leading up to the ‘‘Idea,’’ 
the distinctive advance of meaning over what the concept 
had in the other two parts consists in the implied agency 
that performs the necessary synthesis of being and mani- 
festation. Because of this implication the concepts of the 
Notion may be considered ‘“‘concrete,’’ but the ‘‘Idea’’ is 


Zo 4 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


more than a concrete concept or universal; it is a self. 
The inference can be drawn from his argument that all 
concrete things of experience are such because of the fiction 
of selfhood that we ascribe to them. Without the ascrip- 
tion of selfhood, things would disappear and nothing 
could save them. ‘This brief statement of Hegel’s thought 
movement or ‘‘Dialectic’’ gives scarcely a hint of the im- 
pressive richness and convincing power of his argument. 
He laid bare the structure of the universe as knowable 
and therefore rational. In doing so he enthroned the 
self .+4 


The foregoing interpretation of his system is called in 
question by some of his ablest followers. [hese thinkers 
maintain that Hegel never actually transcended the notion 
of a perfect system, hence was from first to last an intel- 
lectualist. His system is, for these interpreters, a purely 
logical manipulation of ideas. A certain ambiguity run- 
ning through his entire argument makes the rival inter- 
pretations possible. As he persisted in calling the ultimate 
principle of explanation the “Idea” or “Notion” 
(‘‘Begriff’’ which means “‘concept’’), he made the second 
interpretation easy and plausible. ‘This second interpre- 
tation has generally prevailed among students of Hegel 
though it is apparently not the one he himself intended. 
Therefore we shall have to review certain very difficult 
conceptions of selfhood developed by his followers, espe- 
cially those who followed him afar off. Of these we may 
profitably consider the two foremost English representa- 
tives, F. H. Bradley and Bernard Bosanquet, and the 
leading American representative, Josiah Royce. While 
these three have acknowledged general allegiance to Hegel, 
they endeavor to improve upon him by taking over what 
is valuable in empiricism and other more recent develop- 
ments. ‘hey will interest us the more because, interpret- 
ing the Hegelian view as the apotheosis of system, they 


14[In support of this interpretation, cf. Calkins, The Persistent 
Problems of Philosophy, 5th edition, p. 382 ff.; Baillie, Hegel’s 
Lager pp. 4 4360218 1; 


CONTEMPORARY THEORIES 295 


have worked out its implications. After we have con- 
sidered the three briefly, we shall be ready to gather up 
from all available sources whatever will throw light on 
the essential nature of the self and its relation to the world 
and to the future. 


Bradley sets forth his view in his systematic treatise, 
Appearance and Reality, and in a supplementary volume, 
Essays on Truth and Reality. In the treatise he is chiefly 
intent on exposing the inconsistencies and ambiguities 
that vitiate the philosophical world-views prevalent at 
the time of its publication. His success precipitated a 
crisis in English thought. But when he entered upon 
his constructive effort, he was much less successful. His 
keen dialectic could all too easily be turned against his 
own positive conclusion. Hence the total effect of his 
thinking is prevailingly negative. “The more the student 
of Bradley insists on being rigorously logical, the more 
hopelessly and utterly negative the results appear to be. 
His discussion of selfhood is characteristic. He finds in 
popular thought seven more or less distinct conceptions of 
the self. It is (1) the present content of experience, 
(2) the constant average mass of experience, (3) the 
inner core of feeling, (4) some kind of monad or single 
(non-complex) being, (5) the matter in which the “‘T’’ 
takes a personal interest, (6) the subjective content of 
the self as distinguished from the not-self or the world 
of experience, (7) the mere self as the negative of experi- 
ence, the self that is outside of the purpose at the moment 
of its inception.’® 


Bradley has no difficulty in showing that all these 
conceptions are faulty, that they are full of contradictions 
and hence can be nothing but ‘‘appearances.’”’ (By appear- 
ance, it should be explained, Bradley means a mental 
construction, something “‘ideal.’’ He calls the appearance 
contradictory when he wants to emphasize the impossi- 
bility of its being reality in an assumed non-mental world, 


15 Appearance and Reality, bk. i. chap. ix. 


296 HEOSREB CIN DD SaNy Ginioe 


that is, a world of mere sentiency unmodified by thought.) 
There is no question about the contradictions involved 
in taking any one of these seven conceptions as ontologi- 
cally real. “They are condemned out of hand, because 
they are manifestly mental constructs. “The action is not 
the actor, the affective state is not the feeling subject, the 
experience is not the experient. No conception is so full 
of contradiction as that of the self when thought as less 
or other than an agent. Bradley’s sixth and seventh 
conceptions come closest to the adequate view. But they 
also fail and are cast aside. In the sixth, the self is rep- 
resented as a kernel of being, but with no power to act 
on its own initiative, a mere shadow of objectivity. In 
the seventh, the subject is reduced to a state of feeling. 
Bradley concludes that we cannot know the self, that 
all our representations or conceptions of it are contradic- 
tory and erroneous. He is quite sure that in some sense 
we are selves, but maintains that this can have a meaning 
for us only as we identify the self with experience. He 
says with more vigor than insight, ‘“The Ego that pre- 
tends to be anything either before or beyond its concrete 
psychical filling, is a gross fiction and mere monster, and 
for no purpose admissible.’’*® “This statement is true as 
against any notion that the self can exist in the future or 
the past as an object of experience. ‘The nature of time 
ought to settle that matter without room for controversy. 
The statement is also true in so far as it excludes the 
notion that within the self is a core of being which merely 
exists and is not active in experience. But it is not true 
of the self as that which has the concrete psychical filling, 
the self for which the past exists as past and the future 
as future. “The act of constructing the past and the future 
is no doubt an event in the present, but only for the self, 
with, its power to arrange experiences in a temporal order. 
Though the self is not its psychical filling nor anything 
before or beyond the filling in any objective sense, yet the 
filling declares its presence and expresses its real nature. 


1G Ce cit.) p. Oo 9- 


CONTEMPORARY THEORIES IRS 


Bradley’s unacknowledged reason for his stand against 
the only self that we can construe as real is apparently 
the assumption, made everywhere throughout the book, 
that whatever cannot be fitted into a logical scheme and 
made a part of a system is not real. Nor, according to 
Bradley, is the system itself more than ‘‘appearance’’ 
unless it is all-inclusive and perfectly wrought out. All 
finite conceptions of the system are therefore necessarily 
mere appearance, that is, limited and in need of adjust- 
ment. ‘This conclusion is a truism. No finite mind ever 
normally aspires to infinite and exhaustive knowledge. 
But we can know intensively a great deal about the self 
and its world, and what we know can be tested sufficiently 
to satisfy our needs. That everything must look different 
to an infinite Intelligence we may be sure, for everything 
takes on a new appearance to us whenever we put on 
glasses or open the window or change our interest in the 
object. All that Bradley says about the imperfection of 
human knowledge can be granted; yet we have ways of 
satisfying ourselves that we know what we know, even 
though another being might know it differently. To 
know that our knowledge is relative is to know one thing 
that is not relative. 

But Bradley’s real difficulty with the self is that he 
cannot fit it into his system. He cannot reduce it to mere 
content, psychic filling, or aspects of the changeless whole. 
It refuses to be corralled. If it is to be a part of the 
system, it must be harmonious both internally and in 
its relation to the rest of the system. The law of contra- 
diction is binding on it exactly in the same sense as on 
the system as a whole. Bradley’s Absolute thus excludes 
selfhood from the universe. “The contradiction between 
the conception of a finite self and the exigencies of system 
is far less glaring than the contradiction between the 
conception of an infinite Self as the originator of the uni- 
verse and the view that the universe including all selfhood 
is an absolute system. A system cannot be both subject 
and object, even though it be infinite and all-inclusive. 


298 THE SELF IN TTS WORLD 


The authority of the law of contradiction is decisive in 
the whole realm of intellectual construction. No system 
is immune. But it is different with the self that con- 
structs the system. Of the self one cannot say, as of a 
faulty system, that it is disrupted by contradictions. Nor 
would one be right in saying that it is harmonious and 
devoid of contradictions. Such language simply does 
not apply; it has meaning only for that which the self 
constructs. Bradley therefore fails to find the real self, 
and as a consequence becomes involved in many difficulties 
as he tries to develop his doctrine of reality. He is finally 
compelled to take an agnostic position both with refer- 
ence to the self and to the possibility of knowledge. His 
system as developed in Appearance and Reality thus de- 
stroys itself. 

In his later work, Essays on Truth and Reality, Bradley 
modifies his position to some extent. Here he distin- 
guishes selves from finite centers of experience. “The selves 
are what we have in mind when we think the finite 
centers, and hence are “‘ideal.’’ ‘The finite centers alone 
are real.17 ‘This distinction is valuable. The “‘ideal’’ 
may have a reality of its own, but the reality of the 
thinker for whom the ideal exists is of a different order. 
Yet even with this distinction before him Bradley fails 
of the true insight. ‘The finite centers are for him mere 
manifestations of the Absolute or the “‘All’’ considered 
as a system. ‘Thus considered they have no existence in 
and for themselves. Hence the fundamental characteristic 
of selfhood is overlooked. “The exigencies of his meta- 
physical system distort what would seem to be plain 
matter of experience. He still holds that what cannot 
be incorporated in his Absolute must be set down as illu- 
sory. We see in this contention the persistent working 
of the objectivity prejudice. “The finite center, or the self 
in the sense in which we use the term, thus becomes an 
undefined character. Give it definition, that is, think 
anything about it, and you make it “‘ideal.’’ “That Brad- 

17 Cf, chap. xiv., ‘““What is the Real Julius Cesar?”’ 


CONTEMPORARY THEORIES 299 


ley should have failed is the more significant because he 
not only had unusual powers of clear incisive thought, 
but was very much in earnest about the problem and 
brought to his task great intellectual resources. 

Bosanquet restated the views of his master, Bradley, 
and advanced beyond them in certain particulars.1* A 
brief consideration of his treatment of the self will be of 
interest because he seemed to recognize the real difficulties 
and tried in his own way to meet them. He represented 
the self as more than mere content. It had for him a 
““formal’’ distinctness which consists of certain feelings 
arising both from bodily separateness and from the limited 
and purely personal character of our experiences. He still 
insisted that selves are essentially finite centers of experi- 
ence, and that so long as the formal disparateness lasts 
there can be no dissolution of selfhood. But here emerges 
a difficulty. Selfhood is contingent on the continuance of 
a non-essential aspect of experience; it is a feeling, an 
expression of physical separateness, a manifestation of 
finitude. As such it is precarious, without any assured 
future, a passing phase in the life of the Absolute. In 
short, we have in this conception a grudging recognition 
of something other than content, but the assurance that 
it is unessential and evanescent. 

Bosanquet stresses the importance of the content ele- 
ment in selfhood. Now content according to Bosanquet 
may be common to many or all selves. “Two or more 
people may have the same thought about a given situa- 
tion. As friends, for instance, become better acquainted 
and develop a sympathetic understanding, they think 
alike to an increasing extent. Social life makes a blend of 
individual experiences. In this way a sort of collective 
social self emerges which is super-personal. On this basis 
he argues that as the formal distinctness of selves is really 
unessential and becomes less with the increase of social 
life, the individual self as a distinct individual is destined 


18 The Principle of Individuality and Value, and The Value and 
Destiny of the Individual. 


300 LHE SELPCIN: ET SSWwORKD 


to pass away and be absorbed in the life of the whole. 
What will survive is not a personality or self but a value. 
Each self in its experience will contribute a unique value 
to the life of the Absolute. 


Such, in brief, is the line of thought developed with 
great acumen by Bosanquet. Concerning it, we would 
point out that persons do not blend in society; rather do 
they become more truly and abundantly self-conscious 
personalities as they enter into the experiences of social 
life. Why should Bosanquet have failed to appreciate 
this patent fact? Evidently because he was intent on 
identifying the essential self with its content, its ‘‘psychi- 
cal filling,’’ as Bradley would say. But even the contents 
do not blend; every thought, feeling, volition remains 
unique. Yet each person develops an increasing capacity 
to understand and sympathize with his fellow. ‘This, as 
we know, is made possible by our dependence on the com- 
plex system which we objectify as nature. Owing to this 
dependence we are able to devise the common symbols by 
which we communicate one with another. The limits of 
personality are not transcended in the sense that one per- 
son can actually think, feel, or will for another. The 
mystery of personal influence is not wholly explained by 
our own exposition of the modus; but the physical analo- 
gies on which Bosanquet seems to have relied fail to illu- 
minate the subject. 


We may ask again, Does not Bosanquet know of this 
uniqueness of each individual experience? Certainly, but 
when once committed to the theory that the universe is a 
unitary whole, articulated to the last detail, logically co- 
herent, and orderly in all its manifestation of change, the 
reasoner is not easily persuaded that selves with their in- 
termittent consciousness, limited range of activity, and 
short career can have any substantive existence. In the 
cosmic perspective the self at its best seems but a transitory 
phase of the interweaving and equilibration of cosmic en- 


19 The Value and Destiny of the Individual, pp. 47 f., 54, 58. 


CONTEMPORARY THEORIES 301 


ergies. Monism in the form of a universal system holds 
sway over one’s thinking, and not even the evidence of 
one’s Own unique existence can shake one’s faith. It may 
be worth while to take another look at the self through 
the eyes of the monistic absolutist, and feel the full force 
of the argument against the substantial character of self- 
hood. ‘The theorizer may weil start with the mind-body 
issue. He need not argue that every manifestation of the 
self is physically conditioned. ‘The self grows, matures, 
and wanes with the body. So profound is the depend- 
ence of psychic upon physical functioning that only two 
courses lie open, either to conclude outright that so-called 
psychic phenomena are merely expressions of physical pro- 
cesses, or to acknowledge that they issue from a source 
that is precarious and has no existence in itself. Hence 
One is not permitted to think a dualism of self and body. 
If true to the facts and cogent in deduction, one must con- 
clude that both are transient manifestations of some pri- 
mordial energy, an energy which might be variously called 
substance, life, experience, according as one or another 
characteristic is emphasized. Whatever it may be called, 
it is in truth the Absolute, the All. It comprehends all 
change, yet in itself changes not. Nothing exists in its 
own right except the Absolute. Infinitely complex, it is 
a perfect unity. From its infinite depths all things pro- 
ceed. ‘This doctrine is the utmost reach of intellectualism 
——the view that reality can be exhaustively construed in 
intellectual terms. But the doctrine makes reality a blend 
of all things and gives little real insight. If we focus at- 
tention on the blend, the things of experience disappear 
and we have nothing to explain; but if we are ‘‘tough- 
minded’’ enough to insist that things are things and differ 
one from another, we endanger the unity of the whole. 
Bosanquet, following Bradley, would avoid this well- 
known impasse by emphasizing that the ultimate and all- 
comprehending reality includes an infinity of possible 
objects, some of which are the quasi realities known as 
selves. 


302 THE SEEROUN) LTSi WORD 


The blanket objection to this way out of the intellec- 
tualist difficulties is that if we start with experience, it 
must not be experience in general and in the abstract but 
our experience in its particularity, along with all its impli- 
cations. An experience implies an experient. If we elimi- 
nate the experient, the experience with its content disap- 
pears. Bosanquet cannot have his absolute if he repudiates 
the finite self as a creative energy—a true monad, Another 
way of coming to the same conclusion is to point out that 
with the passing of the finite self would go every reason 
for attributing selfhood to the absolute. An absolute that 
is not a self could be only experience-content, and as such 
would lack every principle of order, and would be with- 
out any conceivable power of self-maintenance. It would 
be without form and void; it would have less substanti- 
ality than the river mist that the sun burns away. Thus 
Bosanquet, in so far as he denies the permanence and cen- 
trality of the self, fails to make provision for the existence 
of his ultimate reality. 


The American representative of this school of thought, 
Josiah Royce, developed a view of the self which is unique 
and original in some respects. He describes the self as in 
form a self-representative system.*° By this he means that 
it is like a perfect map contained within the object 
mapped, such a map showing all the details, including it- 
self drawn to scale. It would involve a map of a map of 
a map, and soon. For Royce, then, the self is an infinite 
series: self-consciousness is consciousness of a self that is 
conscious of its being conscious, and so on into infinity. 
This mathematical mode of expression indicates a signifi- 
cant aspect of selfhood, suggesting that there is in its na- 
ture an element of the infinite. We shall have occasion 
later to consider this, though not mathematically. As re- 
gards the nature of the self’s reality, Royce is clear and 
definite in his rejection of the substance notion. ‘The 
Self is not a Thing, but a Meaning embodied in a con- 


20 The World and the Individual, vol. i. Supplementary Essay. 


CONTEMPORARY THEORIES 303 


scious life.’’** “In the narrowest sense, the Self is just 
your own present imperfectly expressed pulsation of mean- 
ing and purpose,—this striving, this love, this hate, this 
hope, this fear, this inquiry, this inner speech of the in- 
stant’s will, this thought, this deed, this desire,—in brief, 
this idea taken as an Internal Meaning.’’?? These passages 
not only deny that the self is a passive thing, but reject 
any and every conception that can be exhaustively ex- 
pressed in descriptive terms. He explains the term ‘‘mean- 
ing’ by equating it with ‘‘life-plan.’’ “‘Never in the pres- 
ent life do we find the Self as a given and realized fact. 
It is for us an ideal.’’** “‘By this meaning of my life-plan, 
by this possession of an ideal, by this Intent always to re- 
main another than my fellows despite my divinely 
planned unity with them,—by this, and not by the pos- 
session of any Soul-Substance, I am defined and created 
apseinen- 

For Royce, the ultimate Power or Absolute is a com- 
pletely realized Self, differing from the human or finite 
self in being ‘‘a Society of Selves.’’ ‘“Whoever conceives 
the Absolute as a Self, conceives it as in its form inclusive 
of an infinity of various, but interwoven and so of inter- 
communicating Selves, each one of which represents the 
totality of the Absolute in its own way, and with its own 
unity, so that the simplest conceivable structure of the Ab- 
solute Life would: be stateable only in terms of an in- 
finitely great variety of types of purpose and of fulfilment, 
intertwined in the most complex fashions.’’*> ‘The only 
difference, as indicated in this passage, between the human 
self and the infinite self is that the one is a finite represen- 
tative system, while the other includes all the systems in 
the same interrelated whole. Each finite self is thus a sort 
of mirror of the infinite. “The conception is not sun clear. 

21 [bid., vol. ii. p. 269. 

22 Ibid., p. 272. 

23 Ibid., p. 290. 


24 Ibid., p. 276. 
25 Ibid., p. 298. 


304 THE SEL RVING DTS OW Onaga 


Royce maintains that selves are free in the sense that their 
life-plan is unique and expresses their nature. “The prob- 
lem then of my freedom is simply the problem of my in- 
dividuality. If I am I and nobody else, and if I am I as 
an expression of purpose, then I am in so far free just be- 
cause, as an individual, I express by my existence no will 
except my own. And that is precisely how my existence 
expresses, or results from, God’s Will.’ 2° This passage is 
important as indicating how Royce relates the self to the 
Power on which it must ultimately depend. ‘The de- 
pendence is mutual, according to Royce. ‘‘God cannot 
be One except by being Many. Nor can we various Selves 
be Many, unless in Him we are One.’’?” Further light on 
Royce’s conception of the self comes from his treatment 
of moral evil. The self that develops the evil will schools 
itself to ignore the right ideal in favor of one of its own 
choosing.’ "The: ‘rebellious "Self; (7.07 acts wn ee 
viciously acquired naiveté. . . . . Tosin is consciously to 
choose to forget.’’?® Finally Royce speaks with great posi- 
tiveness on the reality of the self. “‘Unless the finite is real, 
the Absolute itself has no Reality.’’*° 

These quotations suggest how readily Royce’s concep- 
tion of the self gains plausibility by illuminating the deep- 
est problems of life. Royce marks an advance upon Brad- 
ley and Bosanquet in giving the self a more positive char- 
acter. For the other two thinkers the self as an individ- 
ual is ephemeral. All that gives it individuality is unes- 
sential, being the effect of bodily connections and certain 
affective states. But Royce places a strong emphasis on the 
reality, uniqueness, and permanence of the finite self. So 
pronounced is Royce in his insistence on the essential per- 
manence of the self that its survival of death seems a mat- 
ter of course. “The self is bound up in the life of the Ab- 
solute. For Royce the Absolute, instead of being an all- 

28 bidy) pi330 f. 

27 Ibid., p. 331. 

28 Ibid., p. 358 f. 

29 Jbid., p. 364, 


CONTEMPORARY THEORIES 305 


comprehending system, is a community of selves, ‘‘the Be- 
loved Community,”’ as he later called it. All this is reas- 
suring. His theory seems to come nearer to doing justice 
to the various aspects of experience than has any other 
that we have thus far examined. 

Royce’s insistence on the self’s being an ideal rather 
than an accomplished fact, a life-plan always in process 
of realization, is profoundly true of the self viewed as con- 
stituted by its own activity. We come to selfhood gradu- 
ally, and never attain it in full measure. All the forces 
that play upon the self in experience contribute to its un- 
folding. Nevertheless we should not lose sight of the 
complementary fact that the self is more than a life-plan 
plus self-consciousness, it is the deviser of the plan. It 
finds itself in its work, but it is not its work, nor the plan 
of the work, nor any or all aspects thereof. It is the 
worker, the agent, the originator of plans. This remark 
may seem an unessential addition to Royce’s thought, but 
in fact it can be shown to be of prime significance. So 
important is it and so manifest even to a wayfarer, that 
we must believe Royce to have been fully cognizant of it. 
Why did he ignore it? Evidently he was preoccupied 
with the activity aspect of the self. 

We have noted two ways of approaching the problem 
of the self. The self may be viewed as an object held in 
the cosmic matrix, where it can adjust itself to some ex- 
tent to its environment. In this role it appears as one of 
the many forms of dependent activity, unique in its com- 
plexity and in its manifesting the phenomenon of con- 
sciousness, but still only a part of the cosmic whole. It 
may seem to be a more or less permanent finite center, it 
may develop unique values, but in the end it must be dis- 
solved into other expressions of the Absolute. ‘This is be- 
cause it never rises above the system, never has any exist- 
ence in its own right. 

The other method of approach is to study the self at 
work and recognize the patent fact of its agency. Then 
the question arises, What assumptions must we make to 


306 THE SELF INVUTS i WORT 


understand its activities, its evident dependence on an en- 
vironment that it does not make, and its world of values 
which so far as we can see are the only values that exist? 
In seeking an answer, we recognize the humble origin of 
the self, how it gradually differentiates itself from its 
world, how it slowly and blunderingly feels its way into 
the consciousness of itself and its power to modify its sur- 
roundings, how it remains to the end profoundly depend- 
ent on the physical instrument called its body. Such facts 
have their meaning. But of themselves they cannot give 
us a theory of selfhood. Whatever assumptions we must 
make to explain the known facts of self-activity should 
therefore have such authority as nothing else can possibly 
have. ‘They must be accepted as true or the whole prob- 
lem of explanation must be given up. 

Now Royce seems to have tried to hold to the first type 
of exposition while recognizing the more vital elements 
in the second. NHence we find, scattered through his later 
writings, statements that appear to satisfy the utmost de- 
mands of the second type; yet whenever he explains these 
statements they are shorn of all that cannot be harmon- 
ized with the first. “The self for him is really never more 
than a conscious life-plan, expressing a unique form of 
activity on the part of the Absolute. It is the Absolute 
who makes the life-plan, the Absolute who is free in its 
realization, the Absolute who alone is responsible for de- 
viations from the way of moral rightness, and the Abso- 
lute alone who makes amends. ‘This hides the self away 
from itself in the all-containing Absolute. Because the 
self is thus misconceived, all else continues to be only 
partly explained. Or rather, because the known charac- 
ter of the self is not recognized and made the basis of ex- 
planation, the whole realm of experience remains in the 
end unexplained. 

Hence while we recognize the value of Royce’s concep- 
tion of the self’s activity, we need to maintain with all 
emphasis that the self is more and other than a life-plan; 
that freedom is not synonymous with uniqueness, that the 


CONTEMPORARY THEORIES 307 


problem of survival is not solved by assuming that a finite 
life-plan as such, in its specific content, is of permanent 
value to the Absolute. 

It is hardly worth while at this point to turn back and 
consider at any length the many variants from the types 
of theory that we have been reviewing. Yet there is one 
that deserves a word because of its specious appeal to a 
wide circle. “The reference is to Wilhelm Ostwald’s con- 
ception of consciousness as a force or energy which can be 
equated with other forms found in the physical world.*° 
This conception suggests Woodbridge’s theory of con- 
sciousness as an objective relation. “The ambiguity is evi- 
dent. If Ostwald means that just as thermal energy may 
‘pass over into electrical or mechanical energy, so it may 
take the form of consciousness without changing its na- 
ture as energy, he is simply describing observable phenom- 
ena and indicating that he can group under one concept 
all known forms of activity, including consciousness. 
This is at best a triumph of classification. “The differences 
remain untouched. But if he means that consciousness, 
as manifesting energy, points to a something other than 
consciousness which somehow maintains itself as energy in 
all forms of its manifestation, the term energy must be 
practically synonymous with the old term ‘“‘force.’’ It 
would then be exposed to all the destructive criticism 
heaped upon that much belabored concept. As already 
pointed out, if a force is posited to explain a given mo- 
tion, it can have the unity only of that particular motion. 
Any change in direction or rate requires a new force to 
account for it. [hese infinitely multiple forces can have 
no connection among themselves, unless the whole trans- 
action is taken over from the non-mental into the thought 
world.*? 

30 Natural Philosophy, p. 185 ff. 


31 In the further discussion of our theme—the nature and destiny 
of the self—-we shall feel free to utilize the best insights of those 
whom we have been criticizing as well as those with whom we more 
fully agree. Among the latter should be included—to mention here 
only recent English and American thinkers—James Ward, The Realm 


308 THE -SERPRVING IDS Gitte 


of Ends; A. Seth Pringle-Pattison, The Idea of God in the Light of 
Recent Philosophy; W. R. Sorley, Moral Values and the Idea of 
God; Hastings Rashdall, Theory of Good and Evil; John Laird, 
Problems of the Self; H. W. Carr, A Theory of Monads; C. D. 
Broad, Mind and its Place in Nature; B. P. Bowne, Metaphysics, 
Theism, Personalism; WW. E. Hocking, The Meaning of Ged in 
Human Experience; M. W. Calkins, The Persistent Problems of Phil- 


osophy; E. S. Brightman, An Introduction to Philosophy, Religious 
Values. 


CHAPTER III 
THE NATURE OF THE SELF 


The more we study the nature of selfhood the more 
we are impressed with the importance of a right point of 
view. The authors whom we have been criticizing fell 
short of a satisfactory conception of the self because they 
persisted in treating the self as an object that can be in- 
spected and described. Apparently no amount of evidence 
against such a method is sufficient to stay successive 
thinkers from trying again. But the self, we must repeat, 
cannot be identified with its experiences taken either sever- 
ally or as a connected whole. ‘To insist on such identifi- 
cation is to bar the way to insight and to land in ultimate 
scepticism. Whatever else we may have to say concerning 
the self must follow from recognizing it as an agent whose 
nature it is to bring new experiences into being. In the 
attempt to work out a conception of the self from this 
point of view, it is well to be economical of theories. 
Unless a theory actually helps to explain the facts to 
which it refers, it can be discarded without great loss. 
This rule of economy is a philosophical truism. Yet we 
must recognize the practical value of devices that rest the 
mind without informing it. We have already met several 
of these mental easements. As regards these, the only dif- 
ference between common sense and critically chastened 
thought is that the former mistakes them for truth and the 
latter knows them for what they are—devices and nothing 
more. Some courage is required to hold to this rule of 
economy and face the consequences. Misunderstandings 
are likely to swarm about one. But to refuse to have a 


309 


310 THE SBLEE IN TES! WORK 


theory where no theory that meets the requirements of 
explanation has been formulated is a mark of intellectual 
freedom. 

If the self is to be the ultimate principle of explanation 
in philosophy, it cannot itself be explained. This seems 
evident. As the active principle the self can explain all 
else, just because everything not a self can be encased in a 
concept, can be grasped intellectually. But the self can 
never resolve itself into a mere content. Hence to the con- 
firmed intellectualist the self seems to be nothing at all. 
Because it escapes from the net of its own categories, it 
has no place in a logical scheme of things; it cannot be 
ruled in or ruled out by the law of contradiction. This is 
what we might have antecedently expected. “The move- 
ment of thought is from concept to concept. There is no 
end to this movement, since all concepts point to some 
concept other than themselves as their explanation. Let 
an intellectualist start on this course of explaining by con- 
necting and with a kind of mental inertia he will insist 
on explaining everything conceptually. When the limits 
of possibility are pointed out to him he is apt to draw one 
of two conclusions. Either he will continue to push on 
into intellectual darkness by trying to explain selfhood 
conceptually, or he will solemnly declare that all knowl- 
edge ends in mystery and nothing is really knowable. 
Neither conclusion is justified. Logically there must be a 
terminus ad quem to explanation, and for philosophy the 
self is that terminus. 

The inference that we cannot know the self because we 
cannot resolve it into something else is far from the truth. 
We know the self—or can know it—more completely 
than we know the objective world. “Through its experi- 
ences it stands revealed in its innermost nature. Our 
knowledge of it is far more intimate and concrete than 
our knowledge of anything else. In fact, this direct ap- 
prehension of the self by the self may well be called pri- 
mary knowledge, since it is the model of all other types, 
Whatever the self distinguishes from itself is known in 


THE NADURESOR THE SEUP io 


terms of itself, is known only representatively. Thus 
things are, strictly speaking, forms of the self’s activity. 
The self is more than feeling, more than intellection, more 
than volition; these are distinguishable aspects of its living, 
active unity. Knowledge of the self by the self, then, in- 
cludes all expressions of its nature as active in apprehend- 
ing and appreciating experience. If, for instance, we should 
study any object as thoroughly as our scientific resources 
might permit, our knowledge woud still be fragmentary 
and incomplete. It would necessarily be abstract. But 
the self can be known as having the experience, with all 
the infinitely varied shades of meaning and all the play of 
sentiment and interest connected with the apprehension of 
the object. We know ourselves in this direct immediate 
way, while we know all else derivatively. 

This statement runs counter to the surface meaning of 
much psychological literature of the day. It is well rec- 
ognized that the child comes to know first the outside 
world, and does not consciously distinguish itself there- 
from until the period of reflective thought is reached. 
The theorizer, having started with this observation, is in 
a fair way to conclude that the self is a derived idea, a 
construct, a concept, and at best a mere “‘appearance.”’ 
The trick is patent. The self constructs its ‘“‘appearance,”’ 
and in the act of constructing, disappears, while it con- 
tinues to think of its construct. Its interest in itself has 
not yet been sufficiently developed to cause it to take ac- 
count of itself as the agent by which its conceptual world 
comes into being. Only because the self is essential agency 
does it explain all else. Whatever can be looked upon as 
an agent is the beginning and end of explanation. ‘The 
closer the approximation to the complexity of selfhood, 
the more there is that needs to be explained. Inanimate 
objects are relatively simple. Tying them together in 
bundles with proper labels, exhibiting them as related in 
certain mechanical ways, is all that can be done with them. 
They have the minimum of selfhood in them, and hence 
are seen to be mere activities of something other than 


BZ THESSELESINGETS swOR MD 


themselves. When we pass up through the organic into 
the psychic and social, our knowledge becomes progres- 
sively richer, because the knowing self finds ever more of 
itself in these objects of its experience. But the self is not 
subject to explanation. Nothing in its nature can be ex- 
plained except its limitations, and they indicate more what 
it is not than what it is. Ina sense, then, we must grant 
that the self is a mystery; it cannot be referred to some- 
thing other than itself in the usual scientific method of 
procedure. We can afford to live with one mystery if that 
mystery is ourselves, concerning which we directly know 
so much. In studying selfhood we propose to confine 
our attention largely to the human self, with only a casual 
reference to the more outstanding questions concerning the 
subhuman and the superhuman selves. 

As agent, the self contrasts with all that is not-self, 
with all objects whatsoever. This insight taken in its 
generality may seem little more than a truism, yet it carries 
implications that only the more thoroughgoing accept. 
What, for instance, is the relation of the self to space and 
time and the other structural principles of experience? 
‘The self is not in space though its activities have the form 
of space. Does this mean that the self is indifferent to 
space, that it can be anywhere or nowhere? No. It 
means that the self cannot be thought as in space at all 
without denying its nature as agent. When we try to 
think of the self as real and yet as occupying not even a 
point of space, we are baffled. Our imagination rebels. 
We need to fortify ourselves by a review of the reasons for 
the conclusion that the self is non-spatial and then see 
what we can make of the doctrine. Why, then, must we 
conclude that the self, as the most fundamentally real of 
all existences, is non-spatial? 

(1) Space is the form of the self’s activity. If the 
activity were self-explaining, that is, if we could start with 
pure activity and make it the key to all insight—as some 
have tried to do—we might be able to make space-filling 


1Cf, B. P. Bowne, Theism, p. 41 f. 


TENA DORE ORR URE OS BiG a5 


the sine qua non of reality. But activity is not agency. 
It is simply a name for a form of manifestation. The term 
may be applied to movement of translation or to chemical 
reactions. It may also refer to the mental processes in- 
volved in having experiences. But in no construable sense 
is activity other than manifestation implying an actor. 
Now the self is not activity, nor is it activity plus a non- 
active center of pure being. As actor, the self cannot be 
put among its own objects as one of them. It is distinct 
from them all and cannot have their form. Of all the 
attempts to avoid identifying the self with its activities, 
the least successful is to assume that it is an inactive core 
of being. Such a conception not only fails to explain 
anything, but multiplies difficulties when we try to apply 
it to the problems it creates. 

(2) The self as agent must be a monad, an indivisible 
unity, that is, it must act in its entirety whenever it acts. 
This is a logical requirement and should appear self-evi- 
dent to the reflective mind. If the self could be actually 
broken up into parts, each acting separately, the parts 
themselves would be exclusive of one another and each 
would function as a separate self; each would be unique 
and unitary. If, then, the self is essential agency and 
therefore unitary in the absolute sense, it cannot occupy 
space, since space is the principle of separation and mutual 
externality. There can be no ultimate unity in space. 
This statement is the testimony of scientific research as 
well as of logical deduction. For instance, the atoms of 
science break up into electrons and protons variously ar- 
ranged. These turn out to be merely the imaginary rep- 
resentations of complicated activities called an electrical 
charge. It may include an indefinite number of parts. 
Quite in harmony with the findings of recent science Pascal 
called upon his reader long ago to see in the (abridged) 
atom ‘‘an infinity of universes.”’ 

(3) The self as agent must have an inner life, unan- 
alyzable into disparate elements. “This inner life manifests 
itself as a synthesizing activity, holding in an ideal form 


Oat THE SELEINGIUS WORK 


the past that has ceased to be and the future that can only 
be anticipated. This inner life contrasts at every point 
with what merely occupies space. Space-occupying is pure 
externality; agency is the principle of internality. 


If, then, we conclude that the self is not spatial, we 
should expect that all attempts to read space into the self 
or the self into space would be futile. “They seem to suc- 
ceed because they substitute for the self as agency some- 
thing essentially different. Examples in point are the the- 
ory of W. P. Montague,” that as a form of energy, con- 
sciousness (equated with mind) is space-occupying; and 
that of W. H. Sheldon® that the self is essentially spatial 
because it operates spatially. 


A specious counter argument builds upon experience to 
show that the unity of the self is derived and is the prod- 
uct of a slow development. We are not conscious of the 
self as a distinct and unitary entity till years after we be- 
gin to think and exercise volition—if even then we are 
conscious of it. What the self was before it became aware 
of itself as unitary, we cannot say; but experience shows 
that its unity was acquired. Furthermore this unity can 
easily be lost, as when through illness or injury a pro- 
found change occurs in our emotional life and memory be- 
comes defective. In fact, all breaks in memory mean 
breaks in the continuity and hence in the unity of the self. 
The phenomena of multiple personality are only extreme 
forms of such mental disturbances. In the thought of 
those who argue thus, the self is an experienced unity and 
nothing more. But the self we are considering is neces- 
sarily unitary because it is an agent. The necessity is 
strictly logical. Agency cannot be multiple except in the 
sense of codperation by many individual agents. The 
unity of the self as a condition of its own synthetic activ- 


2 “Consciousness as Energy,’’ Essays Philosophical and Psychologi- 
cal in Honor of William James, p. 105 ff. Cf. The Ways of Knowing, 
Dio. gull. 

8““The Soul and Matter,’’ Philosophical Review, vol. xxxi. p. 
133 ff: 


Mai B ANA DO REVOP (PHETSELE 315 


ity should be distinguished from the consciousness of sub- 
jective unity as revealed to reflective thought. ‘The first is 
certainly non-spatial; the second, being a product, has spa- 
tial relations, at least in the sense that it is where it acts. 
But this form of expression need not mislead us. 

A similar line of thought leads to the denial that the 
self, strictly speaking, is in time. By this is meant that it 
is not, in any thinkable sense, a mere succession. But one 
may ask, Does it not change? Do not all its experiences 
have a place in the time series? Can one conceive of a 
non-temporal existence—one that has no past or future 
or present, no duration? If the self is not in time, is it 
not strictly a nonentity? Such questions come naturally 
to mind. And they are not easy to answer. The tem- 
poralist points out that the self is conditioned by its cos- 
mic environment and must therefore be subject to the 
same law of temporal succession. The self, moreover, 
changes not merely in its apprehension of external events 
that come and go, but in its innermost nature. No con- 
ceivable experience can rise above the temporal flow. 
Hence the self, so the temporalist would conclude, is either 
in time and subject to temporal conditions or it is outside 
the universe altogether, that is, it is non-existent. 

In considering this argument, we need to bear in mind 
that the issue is not whether our experiences have the tem- 
poral form, but whether that which apprehends objects as 
in time is itself subject to temporal conditions. Our prob- 
lem would not arise if experience were self-explanatory. 
He who cannot see that the self is the essential unity pre- 
supposed in all synthetic activity, fails as a matter of 
course to see the reason for the conclusion that the self 
must transcend temporal relations in order to apprehend 
the succession of events as a succession. One way of meet- 
ing his difficulty has already been referred to as offered by 
Bergson, who identifies the self with duration. For him 
the self is the unity and continuity of the succession. But 
as it stands, this conception leaves the self stripped of its 
essential character as agent. [hough the self endures and 


316 THE SELB INGE TS WORKS 


all duration is for a self, the self is not duration. We have 
only to recall, in this connection, how time originates in 
the act of the mind as it creates a past, present, and future 
in which it arranges its experiences. [his temporal dis- 
tribution of the complex mental content is so spontaneous 
and so involved in the possibility of any experience what- 
ever, that, in advance of criticism or in spite of it, we in- 
cline to detach the time element in experience and set it up 
as an independent real. What could be more real than 
duration, since it alone encompasses the succession and re- 
ceives all new members of the temporal series as they 
emerge into the present? ‘This question mistakes a func- 
tion of consciousness for the self that is conscious. 

Nevertheless he who would maintain that the self 1s 
not in time must face the two disturbing facts mentioned 
above. ‘The one is that we not only have temporal ex- 
periences, but we are a part of the interrelated universe 
and subject to the conditions that are themselves in time. 
As thus controlled in our activities, we must belong to the 
cosmic process. [he other disturbing fact, following 
from the first, is that we undergo change in the very cen- 
ter of our being as the result of interaction with the en- 
vironment. We pass from youth to old age and thus ex- 
emplify a time process. In what, then, consists our time- 
lessness? Have we a changeless center of being that man- 
ages to remain outside of the temporal flow merely because 
it does nothing? ‘That view has already been discarded 
and must not at this point be brought in to increase our 
difficulties. 

The way to positive insight is to remind ourselves 
again of the facts revealed by the analysis of sense knowl- 
edge. Whenever we apprehend a temporal series, we 
grasp it as a whole. This may and generally does mean 
that we have lived through it or a similar experience. Buc 
we live through the successive stages of the experience and 
know them as successive only because we ourselves are not 
successive but continuously exist through the series. “To 
grasp the series as a whole and as temporal we must be 


ob Owe Orr a Ti By SL rs 317 


more and other than the series. The succession is the 
work of memory and anticipation, a construct of the self. 
As such it is in the present, though it means a past and to 
some extent a future. If, then, we are entirely clear in our 
apprehension of the self as agent, we may be able to accept 
two statements that seem to contradict each other. One 
of these is that the self is not its experiences and hence has 
not the temporal form of those experiences. “The other is 
that the self is manifested in its experience. All the fun- 
damental characteristics of the experience world, including 
its temporal form, are so many revelations of the nature 
of selfhood. ‘The self and its experiences are strictly rela- 
tive to each other, yet neither is the other. Keeping this 
paradox in mind we can appreciate the truth in Bergson’s 
identification of the self with duration. ‘The self endures; 
we know of nothing else that does, except as an experi- 
ence of a self. Duration then expresses a fundamental 
characteristic of selfhood. But duration is a descriptive 
term that applies to a series of manifestations that have 
the temporal form. Manifestations can exist only in the 
present. Duration, then, in so far as it includes the past 
and the future, exists only ideally as a mental construct. 
We may, therefore, at this point conclude that time, either 
as a succession of instantaneous present moments or as 
duration in which the past, present, and future are ar- 
ranged, has meaning only with reference to the activities 
of the self, not to the self as the active agent. “Though for 
us time begins when we begin to have experiences and will 
end when we cease to be, yet as selves we are not the tem- 
poral flow. 

But the temporalist might reply that this doctrine 
makes of the self nothing but the logical subject of men- 
tal states, whereas the reality is all in the flow. This criti- 
cism has all the advantage of being easily expressed in 
words and of holding strictly to experience. In contrast, 
the view that the self is timeless in relation to its world 
suffers from the handicap that no form of language can 
carry the thought unambiguously. It is further embar- 


318 THE SELF. IN IFS) WORLD 


rassed by having to set over against experience something 
that by its very nature is excluded from experience. There 
surely must be some truth in the contention that the self 
is in time, even though there is ground for holding that 
it is timeless. “[he temporal character of the self is a con- 
viction too persistent to be set aside. In what sense, then, 
is the self in time though actually timeless? It is in time 
for any one who objectifies it. The observer notes 
changes of attitude, interest, conduct in the self observed; 
time infects it all. But the self observed is a construct of 
the observer and as such is an experience having the tem- 
poral form. We are usually so engrossed in practical af- 
fairs and assume so easily the attitude of the observer and 
manipulator that when we would consider the self as a 
reality, we incline to set it in our midst and inspect it as 
we would any other object. “Thus viewed it is of course 
subject to all the conditions of any other features of expe- 
rience. As we have grounds for believing that the cosmic 
power is an Intelligence, we may hold that we are com- 
pletely enfolded in the time of his world. But this again 
can mean only that we are in his time series as object, not 
that we are in the time of our own experience. Now when 
we view our experience as ours—not as it appears to 
others but as it is for ourselves—we cannot identify our- 
selves with our experience, whether in whole or in part. 
We as actor, thinker, agent, contrast with our experience 
as that which possesses the experience. We can confi- 
dently assert, then, that the laws of organization and con- 
struction in experience do not apply to selfhood, and that 
the self, therefore, is not in the time of our own experi- 
ences. ‘To get the full force of this conclusion we need 
to remember that the only time we know is the time of 
our experience world. 

But what of the changing self? If it really changes is it 
not actually in time? Does it not form in its very being 
a temporal series, including the stages of development 
and the linkages we call time? In reply we might ask, 
What in the series would you call the self? Is it the sep- 


THESNASORE SOR THES SELE 319 


arate states, or is it the linkage, or is it the series as a 
whole? ‘The first would resolve the self into elements and 
make knowledge impossible; the second would make the 
self pure duration, which is an abstraction; the third 
would make the self impossible till it ceased to be. That 
the self progressively realizes itself, then, can be construed 
only as meaning that at any time in its career it is all that 
it can then experience, and that as developing it never is 
complete. We must not forget that when we speak of the 
changing self, we are viewing it objectively, exactly as we 
would a physical thing. It changes for an observer. We 
seem to ourselves to change only because we gather past 
experiences together and compare them with those of the 
present, and then think of ourselves as different from what 
we were. But the difference is recognized as consonant 
with the identity. We are the same though different. 
The conviction we have of our identity is normally more 
pronounced than the sense of changing. In fact, we are 
disposed to refer the permanence and identity to ourselves 
as agents and the changes to our mental states. Here we 
face a mystery. Not much light can be thrown upon it 
from any source. How can a self be permanent when 
nothing exists except in the present and the present must 
continuously be renewed? A semblance of explanation 
is found in the idea that the self is a permanent potential- 
ity that is continuously realizing itself. Growth would 
mean an increase in the process of self-realization. In 
view of the fact that there are no assignable limits to its 
potential resources, we may think of it as never exhausting 
itself, never becoming completely expressed. ‘The self as 
thus viewed can hardly be said to exist, it is rather an ideal 
progressively becoming real. This manner of speech gives 
an illusive sense of insight. It is no more an explanation 
of permanence and identity in selfhood than is a topo- 
graphical map an explanation of the country it represents. 

Another suggestive way of making the timelessness of 
the self intelligible is to identify it, as does Royce in cer- 
tain passages already referred to, with a life-plan. The 


320 THEYSEDE GUNEDTS UW OR? 


timelessness of a plan is evident and indisputable; it holds 
over while being realized and exists at one time or another 
indifferently. But this confuses the self with a form of 
its activity. [he timelessness of the plan is the timeless 
grasp by the self of its own ideals. ‘The self lives in its 
activities, all of which have the temporal form, all of 
which express the self, but none of which are the self. 
‘These statements about the self—that it is timeless, that 
it lives through the temporal series which it apprehends, 
that it changes internally—cannot of course be built into 
a system of knowledge. “They seem to be mutually in- 
consistent because they are considered objectively. A sys- 
tem of knowledge is nothing if not consistent. ‘The self 
that constructs the system is nothing if it is consistent. 
In fact, consistency loses its meaning when applied to the 
self. With what, for instance, might it be consistent? 
With another self? But the two would agree or disagree 
only as regards their intellectual constructs. Should the 
self be consistent with itself? But every experience 
changes the nature of the self. It is continually becoming 
something new. It is the only being in the universe that 
can change, because it alone can maintain itself in becom- 
ing something other than itself. Change is read into its 
world of experiences by an act of transferring into that 
world a semblance of its own permanent nature. If then 
it changes, with what shall it be consistent? We say of 
two opposing predicates that the one excludes the other. 
Both cannot be true. But in the process of detecting the 
inconsistency, the self harbors both alternatives, passes 
from one to the other, compares, contrasts, rejects, recalls, 
with never a thought of its own consistency. Only when 
interested in the question of truth or falsity in the con- 
sideration of thought-content does it bring forward and 
apply its rule of consistency. The self is inclusive of every 
possible inconsistency, but in matters of belief it cannot 
accept as true two propositions that are mutually exclu- 
sive. 


He TEN AC eNO ec rd ream ted Fe di 


But after all that we have said about the permanence 
of the self, must we not still acknowledge that the self is 
a part of the world process and therefore in time? ‘The 
self is conditioned in all its activities. It can never rise 
above these conditions; they affect every part of its being. 
In answer we can only say that in so far as externally con- 
ditioned, the self exemplifies the time process; but in so 
far as it has selfhood, it is superior to the process. The 
finitude of the self as we know it makes this double refer- 
ence possible. A complete self would be an infinite self, 
and hence independent of the conditions of any and every 
temporal succession. 

After what has just been said it is hardly necessary to 
insist that none of the other constructive principles of the 
internal or external world can describe the self. It is 
neither substance nor attribute, neither one nor many, in 
the sense in which these categories refer to experience. The 
term substance has repeatedly been employed to character- 
ize the self, but generally with unfortunate results. Sub- 
stance as experienced is a mental construct. Yet the term, 
when carefully defined as meaning that which maintains 
itself through its experiences, expresses exactly one aspect 
of selfhood. In this sense the self is preéminently a sub- 
stance—the only substance that exists ontologically. But 
neither the term substance nor the Bergsonian term dura- 
tion quite expresses what we mean by the power of the 
self to know itself as having lived through a past, and as 
having a capacity to maintain itself through a succession 
of new experiences. But is not the self one rather than 
many? Yes, if we make a qualification similar to that 
made in the case of substance. It is not one in the sense 
that it is a purposive whole, for that would make it exist 
only as the expression of a back-lying self. As an agent 
it is not only unitary, but the source of all derived uni- 
ties. So we might run the entire gamut of categories and 
show that none of. them, without fundamental change of 


meaning, can apply to the self. 


io ¥. THE ‘SELFOIN (ITS WORED 


When we have done cataloguing what the self is not, 
have we not disposed of it entirely, bowed it out of the 
universe? The inclination is to turn for light to such a 
writer as F. H. Bradley, and with him identify the self 
with experience. ‘Ihe need is desperate to make this the- 
ory work at all hazards. We could then have experience 
to build on and to refer to as our final court of appeal. 
May not experience, after all, be the whole of reality? 
We may call it life if we please, all-pervasive, ever chang- 
ing, indestructible, and under certain conditions attaining 
consciousness, even self-consciousness.t Only experience 
can be directly studied, it alone is susceptible of proof or 
disproof. As experience is potentially rich beyond all 
computation, we have no right in advance of an exhaus- 
tive study to say that it may not include all that we have 
tried to set over against it as a self. What may seem to 
be deeper than experience is not self but life, and life is 
just the constant factor viewed as expressed in experience. 
Such attempts to escape the necessity of positing a reality 
that sharply contrasts with experience and yet is wholly 
expressed in experience is successful only so long as we re- 
main close to the surface and refuse to be persistently crit- 
ical. The self is not any or all of its experiences, though 
these tell what it can do. It is not a life-plan, though 
without a life-plan the self could not know itself as a uni- 
tary whole. It is not a feeling nor a psychic content of 
any kind, though Bradley is right in saying that it is 
nothing (objectively) beyond or besides the “‘psychical 
filling.” 

All these reiterations are for the purpose of making im- 
pressive the truth that the self belongs to a different order 
of being from the rest of the universe. This truth might 
be taken for granted were it not for the fact that the self 
is so persistently objective in its interests; it is so absorbed 
_ in the task of adjusting itself to its environment. It is at 
home in its world and insists on remaining contented 
there. It is fascinated by the game of living; its eye is 

4Cf. H. Wildon Carr, A Theory of Monads, chap. xiii. 


THE NATURE OF THE SELF BLO 


fixed on the goods that experience reveals in such exhaust- 
less profusion. Why should it concern itself with what 
cannot be objectified or experienced or even imagined? 
So the self reasons itself away from the deepest, most sig- 
nificant truth concerning its own real nature. That we 
as selves exist, few would gainsay; but what we are and 
what we may become, people generally are not much in- 
terested to know. Or rather they quite uncritically locate 
the self where it cannot possibly be found. Assuming 
that the self as a reality in the midst of realities must be 
an object with apprehensible qualities, they look upon the 
self as a space-filling, continuous substance capable of 
functioning in ways recognized by introspection. “They 
can hardly fail to see the shortcomings of their theory 
when they try to explain how such a self as they portray 
confronts its characteristic task of relating, changing, ap- 
preciating its experiences. Better far to have no theory 
than such as this, which lands one in hopeless confusion. 
The only reason for affirming a self distinct from its world 
is to explain the possibility of experience. If the self 
could be explained as experience, it would presuppose an- 
other self as its creator. In passing from experience to a 
self, we pass out of one world into another toto celo dif- 
ferent. ‘his difference is so fundamental that the self 
cannot be expressed in thought terms. 

What, then, is the self? we ask again. To give our 
answer positive content we must tell what is included in 
the oft-repeated statement that the self is agent. “To do 
this we need to turn again to experience where the self is 
at work. For although we do not experience the self, we 
do experience what it does, and what it does tells us what 
it is. Hence all the interests that have appealed to us as 
worth considering, all the difficulties encountered, all the 
issues met, must come up again in a general way for final 
review in studying the self as the originator of its world 
and as constituted by its world. We are at the center of 
insight, and as we look out over the world of experience, 
we see it all in a new light, with a new perspective. The 


Oat THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


world is seen to exist in and for the self, while the self is 
revealed as living in and through the world. 

From this central viewpoint the universe is a world of 
concreted values. When studying the world as value, we 
had to face the problem of moral choice, and found that 
the basal issue was whether the choice was real, whether it 
expressed a free act of the self. This problem of freedom 
must again be taken up in its broader aspects as involving 
the most decisive issue in the discussion of selfhood. When 
studying xsthetic values, we found that the heart of the 
esthetic experience was the playlike spontaneity of the 
self in creating an ideal world. To what extent is the 
self creative? is another question that we shall have to 
consider. In sketching some of the more outstanding cog- 
nitive values, we felt keenly our intellectual limitations 
as human beings. Having an infinite world of possible 
knowledge all about us, we are, to use the Newtonian 
figure, like one who gathers a few pebbles by the sea- 
shore. With defective memories, blurred vision, a con- 
fused thought life, a will that all too easily falters, and 
an emotional bias that clings to prejudices, we seem to 
be foredoomed to small attainment in the way of knowl- 
edge. ‘his raises the question of the relation of the mind 
to the body as the seat of our limitations. What signifi- 
cance has the body for the life of the self? “This moot 
question cannot be dismissed without some consideration. 
Finally our study of religious values accentuated the prob- 
lem of human destiny—the self facing its future. This 
question of destiny, the most difficult as well as the most 
vital to the thoughtful mind, involves the relation of the 
self to the cosmic Power. With a brief examination of this 
problem we shall close our study of selfhood. 

As agent the self is unique. There is nothing more 
fundamental and nothing like it. The universe is a dual- 
ity: agent, on the one hand, and activity, process, energy, 
experience, on the other. This duality cannot be cancelled. 
Neither type of existence can be reduced to the other, 
neither can exist without the other. To know the self as 


eaten AOR ee Obra Ghih SEL ba 


agent is to know its character as revealed in its activities. 
Its world is itself manifested. If we would understand 
the nature of the objective world, we must ultimately turn 
to the self for the answer; if we would know the self, 
we must point to its world of experience as the expression 
of itself. Furthermore the self is not merely a constructor 
of objects out of preexisting material; it is not a mere 
artificer, but is in very truth a creator. 

The intellectualist is likely to take umbrage at the 
statement that the self is literally a creator, and that crea- 
tivity is of the essence of selfhood. He can find nothing 
in the realm of concepts that even remotely resembles the 
activity of creation. For that reason he is tempted to put 
off the issue by referring the apparent creativity of finite 
selves to the ultimate Source of things. But this helps to 
insight not at all. It simply makes the difficulties in- 
volved less pressing for the man of the street. It were 
better to face the evidence and take the consequences. If 
we cannot intellectually construe creativity, one of two 
courses is Open to us; we may deny creativity altogether 
and take refuge in the concept of potentiality, or we may 
insist on accepting the facts of experience just as they 
present themselves and draw the obvious conclusion with- 
out recognizing the right of the intellect to adjudicate the 
case. In favor of the first alternative is the logic of the 
old dictum, Ex nthilo nihil fit. It seems self-evident and 
it seems to apply. The so-called creative act would mean 
bringing into existence what did not exist before, making 
something out of nothing—a palpable absurdity. When 
stated negatively, the principle of criticism seems self- 
evident: nothing can come of nothing. But when given 
a positive expression, that is, when its positive implica- 
tions are considered, it does not make the same logical ap- 
peal. Positively it means that all things have existed from 
the beginning; change is illusory. Apparently the only 
escape from this conclusion is into the dark, mysterious 
realm of potentiality. But this is only a catch-word. The 
denial then of creativity gives us a ‘“‘block universe’ and 


326 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


flouts experience. We know from experience that the 
future does not exist in rerum natura until it is set before 
us as constituting our present. To say that it lurked in 
the recesses of the past waiting for the moment of mani- 
festation, is to talk gibberish. Change is a fact, however 
little the intellect can make of it, and change means the 
appearance of what did not exist before. What right have 
we to say that? May not change be the appearance of 
what existed but was for the time invisible? Realists gen- 
erally hold this view. But we have seen how unmanage- 
able it iss A phenomenal world that is independent of 
us and exists changelessly could not possibly be known to 
us as the changing world of our experience, a world that 
is continuously coming into being. But the word “‘poten- 
tiality’’ arrests the imagination. The potential is pictured 
as the exhaustless reservoir of all future events. It pro- 
vides for all contingencies, even our blunders, inaccuracies, 
and contradictions. And so we rest from our troublesome 
questions, till we again become critical and want to know 
the facts. 

The facts of experience cannot be gainsaid. Every fea- 
ture of our known world comes into being by an act of 
the self, and every feature is something entirely new. To 
be sure, this creativity, so far as the outside world is con- 
cerned, is strictly under control by a Power not ourselves. 
At least this is true of the initial stages. Yet without 
question the response to stimulation is in every respect 
different from the stimulation itself. So great is the crea- 
tive impulse in the self that only a small portion of any 
familiar stimulus-complex is ordinarily needed to phe- 
nomenalize a whole group of objects. Nothing is easier 
than the act of creating. The mind indulges not only 
when goaded from without, but on its own initiative. 
Perhaps the keenest pleasure of which we as thinking be- 
ings are capable comes in the act of imaginative creation. 
Our emotions become enlisted, self-stimulation reacts to 
increase itself, and we revel in a world that is all our own, 
a plaything that we can change at will. In fact, the world 


THE NATURE OF THE SELF B27 


we live in is an intermingling in varied proportions of 
direct responses to cosmic stimulations and the free play 
of fantasy. 

No amount of such activity seems to lessen the mind’s 
capacity to create. This is a marvel too great for some 
sober thinkers to accept. They would make a distinction 
between creating a world and having images of external 
objects. The one is the act of bringing into existence what 
did not exist before, except possibly in the thought of the 
ultimate Reality, the other is an act of apprehending what 
is given. But we have seen that this distinction will not 
hold as against the conclusion that the mind is essentially 
creative in all its work. The distinction has its place and 
value when we are interested in contrasting the inaccurate 
notions that we carelessly take to be true with the appar- 
ently independent world of objects that compel us to re- 
vise our erroneous conceptions. But when we speak of 
the mind's creativity, this contrast does not come into view. 
Both terms of the contrast—the images and the phenom- 
enal objects—have their origin in the mind, but one is 
valid and the other is not. If we deny the marvel of 
creativity, we must abandon all hope of explaining how 
knowledge is possible. “This is the testimony of history as 
well as of logic. 

The intellectualist speaks again. Is there no way of 
satisfying the desire to understand creativity? Must the 
choice be between potentiality and nescience—a choice that 
is no choice? Apparently these are the alternatives until 
we pass out of the domain of changeless concepts into the 
midst of volitional experiences where the self is enacting 
the role of creator. “There we may note what it does, 
may see how the new appears as a result of its agency. 
The mystery of how the non-existent can come into being 
remains a mystery, but it is carried back not to an impos- 
sible objective world of potential existences that have no 
actuality, but into the life of the self that can know itself 
as having been in the past, as active in the present, and 
as holding a power of future action. Permanence, re- 


328 THE SELB WIN TTS WORED 


vealed in memory, belongs by inherent right to selfhood 
alone. In the life of the self the term potentiality has a 
serviceable meaning, as we have already pointed out. “The 
self may know enough of the present situation to antici- 
pate the future. In that sense the future is potential in 
the present. When the barometer falls rapidly, we have 
reason to expect rain or high wind. ‘The rain or wind is 
potential in the atmospheric conditions that cause the baro- 
metric pressure to lessen. But we are not at liberty to use 
the word in this sense when we would make it hold the 
future as a quasi present existence. “The future exists only 
for a self and in the act of anticipation. “[he mystery of 
mysteries, then, is the self in its power to know and to do. 

The self is creative, but is it free? We can readily see 
how those who discount the self as merely the name for a 
stream of consciousness, or as identical with its world, or 
as mere ‘‘psychical filling,’’ should not only deny the free- 
dom of the self, but should be annoyed that anybody 
should still raise the question.° But from our point of 
view, freedom might be taken for granted. We could 
recognize all the evidence pointing to the limitations of 
human freedom, and yet maintain that these limitations 
only accentuate the fact of freedom within the prescribed 
limits. “The burden of proof would seem to rest with 
those who deny freedom, or with those even who would 
limit it. In other words, it seems to us that the self is 
free except as the indubitable facts of experience establish 
a limit beyond which the self cannot exercise its freedom. 
‘This reversal of the current attitude toward the question 
has thus far been based largely on moral considerations, 
though at every critical stage in our discussion of sense 
perception as well as of elaborated knowledge, we came 
upon evidence of the self’s power to act on its own initia- 
tive. In facing the implications of the moral life, we had 
to conclude that to be moral the self must be free. It 
must be free not only in the negative sense—free to run 
its preéstablished course unobstructed—but free to plan 


5 Cf. Bradley, Appearance and Reality, pp. 393n, 435n, 


Une ONA TURE Ob? Poni SELB a29 


and execute its will in the light of its own ideals of good. 

Against the doctrine of human freedom in the positive 
sense have been ranged (1) all the considerations drawn 
from the scientific study of human conduct, and (2) the 
metaphysical scruples arising from the utter dependence 
of the finite on the infinite. “These difficulties are formid- 
able. “They combine apparently the weight of scientific 
authority with that of metaphysics. “They must be met, 
therefore, by counter evidence both indisputable and con- 
clusive, if the doctrine of freedom is to have any stand- 
ing among thoughtful people. ‘The first impulse is to 
point as we did to the exigencies of the moral life as fur- 
nishing such evidence. But ethical literature is replete with 
attempts to explain the facts of our moral consciousness in 
accordance with determinism. For instance, the conscious- 
ness of freedom, on which the libertarian stakes much, 
may mean merely that no effective opposition is felt to a 
thoroughly predetermined course of action. If such an in- 
terpretation be allowed, then the consciousness of freedom 
can at best mean only a possible absence of restraint, free- 
dom in the negative sense, such as the proverbial flying 
arrow might have. With the same ease every requirement 
of a theory of morals might plausibly be met by deter- 
minism. Is it a question of responsibility? The deter- 
minist can say that the individual is responsible for his acts 
only in the sense that they are the result of his character— 
rational and emotional—interacting with his environment. 
The man is his character, and his character is the accumu- 
lated effect of his conduct. Do we mention the possibility 
of following the weaker motive? “The motive we actually 
follow is demonstrably the strongest, else why should we 
follow it? But what of the sense of guilt and remorse? 
They can be explained psychologically without recourse 
to the doctrine of freedom. Moreover, whatever one’s 
theory, it is eternally right to be just, benevolent, temper- 
ate, true. Consequences do not wait upon opinions about 
the self. Thus the determinist can apparently undermine 
all the usual arguments for freedom as popularly under- 


330 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


stood. For this reason it will be better to find, if possible, 
a less debatable starting point for the positive argument in 
support of freedom. We can then turn with greater as- 
surance to the consideration of the determinist’s attempt to 
banish freedom from the field of morals. 

The advocates of determinism make their strongest ap- 
peal by pointing out that their doctrine is grounded in the 
scientific law of causal connection. ‘This law, they urge, 
holds not only throughout physical nature, but in the life 
of thought, feeling, and volition. No event without a 
cause; nothing isolated, nothing unconnected with what 
preceded it. ‘The law is as true of self-activities as of the 
external world. What is the self? Is it not, so the de- 
terminist argues, a complex product of growth? Did it 
not start with a definite equipment of potentialities and 
tendencies? Were these not elicited and developed by inter- 
action with environing conditions? Do not the results 
show themselves in reflexes, impulses, habits, tastes, inter- 
ests, and whatever constitutes the character of the indi- 
vidual? Character is the expression of causal laws working 
with resistless certainty. Character changes under the in- 
fluence of new experiences. It is subject to continuous 
growth. Every act, whether volitional or impulsive, leaves 
its impress. hus while every so-called free act is but the 
outgoing of a character impulse, it reacts to make a new 
type of action possible. 

This argument of the determinist has many elements of 
strength. Can it be answered in such a way as to retain 
the truth that it embraces and exhibit the whole situation 
as involving freedom? ‘There iscommon ground in certain 
propositions which both parties to the controversy doubt- 
less accept. First, the self has a nature; that is, all its ac- 
tivities are subject to law. No other conception of the self 
is thinkable. Secondly, the past of the self enters into its 
present life as a controlling factor in determining what the 
self may consider desirable. Thirdly, however free the 
self may seem to be, its every act can be viewed objectively 
as a member of a causal chain. Every act, that is, takes its 


THE NATURE OF THE SELF 55) 


place in the world order and thus becomes related to what 
precedes and what follows. Fourthly, every so-called free 
act is completely motivated by the needs, interests, and 
capacities of the self at the time. No act of self-expression 
is isolated. Fifthly, freedom does not pertain to the acts 
but always and only to the self as intelligent agent. 

With these acknowledgments of the truth embedded in 
determinism, we would call attention to certain conclu- 
sions already established. The scientific doctrine of causal 
connection is recognized as not a theory of productive effi- 
ciency, but only an emphatic assertion of orderliness in 
nature. It is an a priori assumption involved in the know- 
ability of our experience world. No objective proof could 
avail to establish it if it were not presupposed in all think- 
ing. Asa law of thought it requires that every situation, 
however chaotic it may at first appear, must be so analyzed 
and adjusted as to exhibit orderliness. Every event must 
have its selected antecedents from which it follows accord- 
ing to rule. But does this mean the more law the less 
freedom? Is freedom excluded from a mechanistic view 
of the world? Not at all. 

The conception of the world as mechanism simply ex- 
presses the perfection of intelligence and power. If either 
were lacking to any appreciable extent, unthinkable con- 
fusion and chaos would result, and life would be impos- 
sible. The causal law then is the requirement of thought 
in its effort to satisfy its own ideal of order. In so far as 
the thinker is free he will endeavor to realize this ideal. 
His success will measure his freedom. We must then revise 
the ordinary dictum and say, the more order the more 
freedom. But such a conclusion would apply only to con- 
scious volition. From this point of view the entire mass 
of scientific achievement is the consummate expression of 
freedom. We may carry this line of reflection a step 
further. 

We take orderliness to be a fundamental law of thought 
because the purpose of thinking is to attain certitude in 
beliefs. We would form workable conceptions of our 


332 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


world. We would know the truth. But our efforts are 
beset by difficulties. Error lurks in every conclusion that 
is not critically thought out. How may we know this fact 
of error? Evidently only as we can test our conclusions 
in the light of criteria set up by the mind itself. In short, 
to know the simplest fact of nature, we must be able, first, 
to distinguish between truth and error, and secondly, to 
find grounds for establishing the one while discarding the 
other. Both these conditions reveal the presence of freedom 
in the positive sense. Without the power to apply a stan- 
dard we could not know when we had the truth. Every 
belief would have to be taken at its face value as a matter 
of course, merely because it existed; or utter and all- 
inclusive scepticism would result. Either alternative would 
paralyze volitional activity and cut us off from ever attain- 
ing to real knowledge. But this act of holding up to view 
a conclusion or belief and asking if it be true is strictly 
an expression of freedom. It would be inconceivable 
as anything less. “Then the machinery of testing, the criti- 
cal review of previous thought, the marshaling of new evi- 
dence, the application of the method of “‘trial and error,”’ 
all mean the exercise of freedom. Without freedom the self 
could not take one step in the acquisition of knowledge, 
could not even know that such a thing as truth or error 
existed. 

When once we catch the force of such considerations, 
we can combine them with the moral argument and see 
how they support each other. As the moral argument for 
freedom has already been stated, we need not review it 
here. The deterministic interpretation of moral facts and 
implications is specious, and gains most of its plausibility 
through the focusing of attention on the relation of an 
act to preceding conditions—a relation which a libertarian 
has no interest in questioning. Asa counter to the determi- 
nistic argument it would not be difficult to show that its 
scientific support when rightly understood falls away, or 
even passes over to the indirect support of libertarianism. 
All that the argument drawn from psychology and related 


JORUNA DURE OR DE Se Lr 330 


sciences proves is that the question of freedom not only 
can but must be ignored if we are to be scientific. Until 
we transcend the standpoint of science, the question of 
freedom does not arise. Why then does the scientific stu- 
dent so persistently conclude to determinism? Because he 
inconsequently carries the problem of freedom over into 
science and there demands a solution. The only solution 
is an artificial one, because from the scientific point of 
view the question is itself artificial and essentially absurd. 

Science can say no more than that the self, treated 
objectively, is a series of states connected in an orderly 
way. Scientific determinism, in so far as it is a theory of 
real or productive causation, is a denial not only that the 
self is free but that there is any self. The last word of 
science is process. What is not process does not exist—and, 
we may add, what is process exists only for that which is 
not process. The dilemma is familiar to us. Its very es- 
sence is the denial of freedom. For unless the self is free, 
there is nothing in it to distinguish it from the rest of 
objective nature, hence it passes away into process. Unless 
it is free, it is not an agent in any conceivable sense. Un- 
less it is free, it can at best be only a center of activity by 
a back-lying agent. We thus get a hint of how all problems 
in philosophy, all questions we may ask about the world 
or ourselves, culminate in the question of freedom. The 
first step in explanation cannot be taken without implying 
freedom, and each advance accentuates its reality. 

But how are we to meet the metaphysical difficulty of 
our essential dependence on the ultimate Power? It cannot 
be met on its own plane, because its assumption is that 
the connection between the ultimate Power and ourselves 
is analogous to that between an external substance and its 
states, or between the law of a system of interacting units 
and the units themselves. We thus start with an a priori 
conception of what the dependence must be, and in its 
name deny that the dependent can exercise freedom. But 
the analogy does not hold. Every consideration pointing 
to the fundamentally different status of selfhood from that 


334 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


of mere events emphasizes the ineptness of the analogy. 
Even at the risk of further repetition it may be worth 
while to bring this fact into relief. 

The objective attitude is so much a matter of habit 
and is so important in reckoning with nature, that its 
influence remains potent in ordinary thinking even after a 
person is convinced of its inappropriateness for certain 
philosophical investigations. It is a persistent bent in 
human nature to demand that experience explain experi- 
ence, that events control events, that things cause change 
in things, and that the whole constitute a self-explaining 
system. Any given event is thus assumed to be adequately 
accounted for by showing that its invariable antecedent is 
a certain group of preceding events. “This assumption is 
abetted by the crude notion that something—substance, 
energy, force, or influence—actually passes from the ante- 
cedent into what follows and explains the resulting change. 
“Does not the antecedent,’’ one may say, “‘disappear in 
producing the event? The continuity of nature is thus 
preserved. There is no evidence that matter is ever de- 
stroyed. It simply changes its form of manifestation.” 
The plausibility of such reasoning gains decidedly in con- 
vincing power since the doctrine of the conservation of 
matter apparently solves the problem of sameness and dif- 
ference. Ihe sameness is provided for by the assumption 
that whatever appears in the resultant was already in the 
antecedent and only required the appropriate conditions to 
emerge. The difference is evidenced in the modification of 
the thing affected. Hence nothing has really changed; the 
potentialities of nature have been realized. 

Such are the thoughts behind the notion that the Power 
to which we must refer all reality cannot create free beings. 
He is conceived as essentially a thing with a thing’s limi- 
tations. The only way, then, that he can produce finite 
beings must be by diremption, partition, fission, or some 
form of degradation of himself The mystery of change is 
disposed of by impliedly denying the fact of change. No 
other outcome, indeed, is possible to a purely mechanistic 


THE NATURE OF THE SELF 335 


explanation. It must carry back into preceding sources all 
the complexity of the later manifestations, or else leave 
something unprovided for. Thus nothing is explained. 
The relation of the ultimate Power to finite selves is left 
absolutely opaque. The ultimate Power is reduced to a 
mere aggregate, and change becomes a shifting of material 
from one part of the time series to another. Only the most 
reckless self-stultification can accept such an outcome. To 
deny change, to reduce the self to a phase of the Infinite, 
to look upon the Infinite as an aggregate, the quantitative 
all, is to abandon explanation. It may impress one as in- 
tellectual humility, but it makes the victim a martyr by 
mistake. 

That the difficulty in the conception of independence 
has no ground in reason but is merely the result of a 
blunder may be seen by reflecting on the obvious fact that 
in nature all is activity, movement, change, and nothing 
survives of itself across the smallest interval of time. The 
process is continuous. Nothing is, but all is becoming. 
Nowhere in the process is there the slightest self-depen- 
dence; no portion can maintain itself. This means that 
the explanation of apparent permanence and continuity 
in nature can be found only in that which is distinct 
from nature, a Power whose characteristic is its ability 
to maintain itself while ceaselessly producing a world of 
activities. In this connection it cannot be too much em- 
phasized that no back-lying world essentially similar to 
the world of experience can possibly supply the permanent 
element. Neither a potential world nor an actual world can 
meet this sine gua non of real existence. Only a self can 
satisfy the requirements. And we know it can do this 
only because it demonstrates its capacity in experience. 
The self can because it does. We reach the end of insight 
when we recognize this fact and build upon it. Me- 
chanism does not help us except to set before us a scheme 
that satisfies the imagination, though it ignores reason. We 
presumably have a choice of alternatives. Either we may 
limit ourselves to the mechanistic type of explanation, 


336 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


which not only fails to provide for creativity, but leaves 
all change an impenetrable mystery, or we may accept the 
theory of continuous productivity, for which we have the 
best analogy in our own mental life. 

Once we admit that the ultimate Power is pure crea- 
tivity, the problem of freedom involves no insuperable 
difficulty. We need simply refer to this Power as the ade- 
quate Source of all that experience reveals. he question 
of how a free intelligence can be created, just as the ques- 
tion of how anything can come into being, remains un- 
answered. We have no revelation on that point. 

But the objector may interpose a demurrer. ‘‘Depend- 
ence we must grant, and if that is thoroughgoing, what 
becomes of freedom? Even though you assume that the 
ultimate Self fashions the universe according to his sover- 
eign will, it is still his will that dominates. Nothing can 
defy him or swerve in the slightest degree from what he 
requires.’ We may answer that this is in essence a repe- 
tition of the difficulty just considered. It is a turning again 
to the a priori method of deciding beforehand what can 
be by assuming what must be, rather than going to experi- 
ence to find out what is, and then trying to explain it. 
We carry over into the unique world of agency the limi- 
tations characteristic of the world of mere activities. Re- 
pudiating this blunder we may ask, “‘Can the ultimate 
Power create free beings?’” and answer our own question 
with confidence, ““Yes, if he does.’’ It is well to remember 
that our only ground for affirming the existence of an ulti- 
mate Power is our need of explaining how we, as finite 
creatures, come into being and maintain ourselves in a cos- 
mic environment. This Power must be assumed as the 
adequate Source of all existences, for he is our only ex- 
planation of selfhood. He is what we must think him. 

‘The creative act by which a finite self comes into being 
cannot in the nature of the case be construed intellectually, 
because it is not an intellectual transaction; it is dynamic 
and volitional. As well try to bottle a sentiment or im- 
prison an aspiration by physical means. When we try to 


THE NA VURE OF) THE SELF Bo 7. 


compass the act by concepts we encounter the same diffi- 
culty as in trying to explain change. Change is an ultimate 
fact, and so is creativity. Every attempt at explanation 
from whatever angle of approach involves us in the tread- 
mill motions of the mechanistic conception. Hence we raise 
a false issue when we ask how it is possible for the ulti- 
mate Power to bring anything new into existence. That 
he does, we know from experience. In like manner we 
must rest in the plain fact of experience that this Power 
creates selves. If we must think about the mystery of crea- 
tion, we should take our own volitional activity as the 
model. We create for ourselves a world in which other 
selves move as real. We influence one another by social 
appeals. We have a sense of freedom which increases with 
the development of social ties and tasks. ‘Thus in the 
world of social forces, the more elaborate and binding the 
connections, the freer we become. Hence freedom means 
power, influence, effectiveness. If we consider the ultimate 
Power after the analogy of our own social creativity, the 
special difficulty of dependence need not trouble us. To 
deny his ability to create free intelligence leaves us in the 
dark on every question concerning ourselves or the world. 
The mystery of creativity remains; but creativity itself is 
the commonest of common experiences. 

We conclude, then, that determinism has not made out 
its case, that it fails to explain experience, and makes the 
simplest item of knowledge a logical puzzle, while it re- 
duces the moral life to a purely fatalistic illusion. It says 
with science that if you want the cause of an event, you 
must look for it in something that preceded it. This of 
course means the infinite regress. It practically ignores the 
self, or else reduces it to a member of the phenomenal 
series, ‘“‘But has the past nothing to do with our acts?”’ 
one may ask. Certainly. ‘The self’s past and its environ- 
ment contain the ground of preference in choosing. Out of 
these sources arise the sense of need, the consciousness of 
capacity, the knowledge of method, and all that can be 
included in the preparation for an expression of choice. 


338 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


But until the self is recognized as willing the result and 
controlling the means to that end, the choice itself is not 
explained. 

This conclusion seems so evident that many of the 
more thoughtful determinists undertake to provide for 
freedom under the form of self-determination. In so doing 
they are concerned to give full value to the influences that 
mold character and thereby affect choice. ‘‘What are we,” 
they say, ‘‘but developed characters? We started with cer- 
tain inherited capacities and tendencies of nature, and these 
were developed by interaction with the environment. In 
this way our characters, including interests, tastes, tenden- 
cies, impulsions, were slowly formed. To the character 
of the individual must be referred everything that the in- 
dividual does. From the depths of his character arise 
every motive and every preference in the choice of goods. 
Moral reasoning is the organized appeal of the developed 
and developing self as constituted by its character.”’ “This 
theory is championed by some of the sanest writers on 
ethics. The theory seems to meet the two fundamental 
requirements as revealed in experience: (1) the significance 
of the self’s original endowment, unique in every indi- 
vidual and varying widely in scope and vigor; and (2) 
the ineradicable sense of responsibility. The argument is 
simple and plausible. Unless freedom is seen as the ex- 
pression of the slowly unfolding character, inherited pro- 
pensities and native limitations mean nothing. The self, 
in acting without reference to them, would be not free 
but a slave to caprice. Responsibility could have no in- 
telligible meaning, since the self would not really be 
acting. 

This line of thought has great convincing power, be- 
cause every contention of the self-determinists must be 
granted, Inherited traits do play their part in determining 
conduct. And so do acquired dispositions and interests. 
The self is its character. But danger lurks in emphasiz- 
ing heredity and environment. As soon as we begin to 
think of character as a resultant, the moral life begins to 


MHE NATURE OF Sine SET 639 


resemble a mere mechanism, in which freedom is annulled. 
We seem to be confronted again by the dilemma—either 
heredity and environment determine conduct, and then 
there is no freedom; or they do not, and then freedom is 
meaningless caprice. The difficulty is real. “There is no 
way of meeting it so long as we try to think a free act. 

Thought, as we have had occasion to point out, can 
set forth the antecedent and sequent events, but not the 
freedom of the act. “hat escapes, absolutely and always, 
any intellectual formulation. We face here the ultimate 
mystery of selfhood. Asan agent the self cannot be an ob- 
ject of intellectual contemplation. By studying the past of 
the self, its habits, interests, and contacts, one may get val- 
uable information bearing on the problem of motivation. 
Practical ethics is occupied almost exclusively with this 
problem. Yet every intelligent volition, however moti- 
vated, when viewed by the actor is seen to be the unique 
expression of the self as agent. It involves the weighing 
of evidence and the rendering of a decision in the light of 
what the self at the moment judges desirable. Character, 
then, is the self considerd as having a developed nature. 
Because the self in free volition acts with a modicum of in- 
telligence, the course of events as studied by an observer 
can be representd more or less accurately in a mechanistic 
scheme. But that does not mean that the self is a char- 
acter mechanism. 

This reference to the orderly procedure of the self in 
Overcoming external conditions brings us to the next 
question. “To what extent is the self a cause and therefore 
free? In answer we may say at once that the self is con- 
ditioned on every hand by the infinitely complex network 
of events called the universe. “This constitutes a perma- 
nent though changing order of limitations. But the phy- 
sical environment is not in absolute control; it only marks 
limits and prescribes methods of action. It indicates the 
measure of freedom that the self can exercise in the phy- 
sical realm. ‘These limitations permit a much larger scope 
of free activity than is immediately evident. Every time 


340 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


we do anything volitionally, that is, with intelligent pur- 
pose, we actually change the nexus of environing conditions 
(the physical order). Both by direct bodily contact and 
by those manifold indirect methods invented by man’s 
ingenuity, we can affect nature over wide areas. When- 
ever we change the conditions we modify the scope and 
character of our freedom, either to lessen it, as when we 
sustain an injury, or to extend it, as when we learn a 
new way to make nature manipulate nature in accordance 
with our desires. 

In our relation to environing nature we continually 
exercise the power of selection, and thereby determine in 
a way what feature of the enveloping conditions shall 
constitute our distinctive environment. When we select 
intelligently we proceed in accordance with the general- 
ized knowledge of the permanent factors. Our ignoring is 
based on knowledge, on that which we have learned is sig- 
nificant to the matter in hand. No environment can hold 
us bound by its individual and specific character. We can 
bring to bear upon it the stored wealth of experience and 
loosen its hold by applying general principles. We know 
how to circumvent, to escape from the toils of “‘brute 
fact.’’ In so far as this is possible, knowledge is liberat- 
ing, and our environment itself becomes an expression of 
freedom. Instead of being controlled by it we make it 
serve our ends. 

Furthermore our sentiments enter into our environment 
and give it a distinctive character. If we allow the hap- 
penings of the day to depress us, we not only see the 
more somber side of nature, but we actually render it 
somber; whereas under other conditions of our inner life, 
we should see attractive beauty. Values in the world 
about us are made and remade in a twinkling, as we 
change our moods and interests. These values, along 
with all that they imply, are the very essence of our real 
environment. ‘Thus we get a suggestion of how exten- 
sive the range of the self’s freedom really is. “he condi- 
tions that limit the self have been studied minutely by 


THEI NA DURE OFTHE SEL Bat 


highly trained specialists; but far less critical attention 
has been given to the study of the self’s free activity within 
those limits. Hence we have a distorted conception of 
the self, one that exhibits it as cramped, shut in, and con- 
trolled by its surroundings. It is progressively reduced 
from a commanding figure in the world to one of less and 
less significance, till the conclusion seems near at hand that, 
if we knew more, we should view the self as nothing but 
a name for a peculiarly complex set of conditions. Perhaps 
it might turn out to be a mere epiphenomenon. In the 
popular mind, the conviction has become deep-seated that 
the scientist is continually reducing the range of freedom 
and that only the more obscure forms of mental activity 
remain unconquered. 

This view receives a kind of support from the phenom- 
ena of habit. We are creatures of habit, so the saying 
goes. But what is a habit? It seems to be a mechaniza- 
tion of conduct. A given act by frequent repetition not 
only becomes easier but gives rise to a tendency to further 
repetition. This tendency may result in the practical 
elimination of conscious attention even in the performance 
of complex activities. [hus the action approximates the 
reflex type. But does this mean that freedom is thereby 
curtailed? Is habit-forming a species of bondage? Not 
necessarily. Viewed from within, a habit may mean the 
reduction of effort and strain in doing a given piece of 
work. Habit enters largely into what we call skill. Of 
course some habits tend to weaken our capacity for volli- 
tion, limit our range of interests, and reduce our intellec- 
tual grasp. In any complete discussion of habit such facts 
must be carefully set forth. But at present we need only 
note that habit may be the ally of freedom; it may mean 
a lessening of tension and strain in the performance of the 
lower types of activity and a releasing of power for the 
higher expressions of the self’s nature. Objectively life 
is becoming more mechanized, but this is a triumph of 
freedom, through the achievement of science in setting its 
world in order. Since freedom does not come within the 


ote THE SELRVINVITS WORBD 


purview of science, a free act will always be for science 
simply a problem in mechanical adjustment. It may re- 
main an unsolved problem, because of its complexity or 
the obscurity of the factors involved. But science will 
never consent to solve it by reference to freedom, for that 
would mean the abandonment of the distinctively scien- 
tific task. Nevertheless all conduct viewed from within, 
as philosophy insists on viewing it, is orderly in propor- 
tion to its expression of freedom. If no law, then no free- 
dom; for a free act is an intelligent act and therefore the 
expression of order. 

We may conclude then, first, that the self, so far as 
it is cause, is free, and it is cause in a positive sense when 
it exercises its power of choice and volitionally effects a 
change in its environment. ‘This conclusion stands with- 
out qualification, and leads to the second, namely, that 
instead of taking the limitations for granted and requiring 
decisive proof of free activity, we should reverse the order 
and maintain that the self is free in all that it does, except 
where positive proof is furnished that it is controlled by 
influences outside itself. “Thus in placing the burden of 
proof on the one who would in any given situation deny 
freedom, we change the whole aspect of our world-view. 
To show this in broad impressionistic outlines will be our 
next task. 

What truth is there, we may ask, in the statement that 
the self is a real determining factor in the ongoings of the 
world at large? It volitionally produces changes in its 
immediate surroundings and through these affects re- 
moter regions. But it would seem that the scope of such 
influences is quite limited. How much is it limited? We 
know without giving the subject more than a moment’s 
thought that our influence on the outlying regions of the 
universe is infinitely slight—at least we think we know. 
We are fairly sure also that this is true of the larger fea- 
tures of the earth’s activities. But to recognize that our 
influence in these macrocosmic realms is practically neg- 
ligible is not to deny that in a genuinely positive sense we 


TEE NO CORE ORD THB VSELE a ny 


share with the ultimate Power both the capacity and the 
responsibility of world ordering. If our part seems in- 
finitely slight, we can assure ourselves that from the stand- 
point of self, the seeming is not all fact. 

We can at least call to our aid the lightning, the steam, 
the power of the waterfall, the heat stored in coal beds, 
and so on. A\ll these servants do our work for us; they 
bend to our wills. How much farther we may in the 
future be able to go in this process, no one can say. 

This much exploited argument in support of a belief 
in freedom encounters a curious rejoinder, not from the 
determinists but from certain champions of freedom. One 
of the most interesting of these attempts, considering the 
high standing of the author in the scientific world, is con- 
tained in Sir Oliver Lodge’s Life and Matter, a book 
written with the avowed purpose of combatting Ernst 
Haeckel’s fatalistic materialism. Lodge holds that the 
doctrine of the conservation of energy is not to be called 
in question. Any view of freedom that hopes to command 
the interest of a scientist must square with this doctrine. 
“My contention then is—and in this contention I am 
practically speaking for my brother physicists—that 
whereas life or mind can neither generate energy nor di- 
rectly exert force, yet it can . .. . exercise guidance and 
control: it can so prepare any scene of activity, by arrang- 
ing the position of existing material, and timing the liber- 
ation of existing energy, as to produce results concordant 
with an idea or scheme or intention: it can, in short, ‘aim’ 
and ‘fire.’ Guidance of matter can be effected by a pas- 
sive exertion of force without doing work; as a quiescent 
rail can guide a train. . . . It will be said some energy is 
needed to pull a hair-trigger, to open the throttle-valve 
of an engine, to press the button which shall shatter a 
rock. Granted: but the work-concomitants of that 
energy are all familiar, and equally present whether it be 
arranged so as to produce any predetermined effect or not 
.... The energy is independent of the determination or 
arrangement. Guidance and control are not forms of 


oat THE SEEF IN PTS OW ORED 


energy.” On the basis of this conception of energy, 
Lodge concludes his defense of freedom by declaring, ‘““We 
are free, in so far as our sensible surroundings and imme- 
diate environment are concerned; that is, we are free for 
all practical purposes, and can choose between alternatives 
as they present themselves. We are controlled, as being 
intrinsic parts of an entire cosmos suffused with law and 
order . . . . If we could grasp the totality of things we 
should realize that everything was ordered and definite, 
linked up with everything else in a chain of causation, and 
that nothing was capricious and uncertain and uncon- 
trolled.’’® 

This attempt of the noted physicist to find scientific 
ground for a belief in freedom is especially interesting, if 
for no other reason, because in the end he is forced to con- 
clude that freedom is only a seeming, and that if we knew 
all we should realize that “everything was... . linked 
up with everything else in a chain of causation.” 

In recognizing that the law of the conservation of 
energy is abstract and purely descriptive of results without 
reference to causes, Lodge is in line to transcend the scien- 
tific conception of experience. ‘he transcendence cannot 
be effected by denying or questioning the law, but by 
realizing that it holds only among objects and their move- 
ments in so far as they are essentially passive. Whatever 
is passive can be mechanically moved and mechanically 
stopped and mechanically adjusted. “he law of conserva- 
tion must hold in such a world. Philosophy, building 
on this view of the world, would call attention to certain 
other features of the problem, features already dwelt upon 
in the preceding discussions. (1) ‘The distinction be- 
tween energy of action and energy of guidance is artificial. 
The physical universe is a nexus of activities, nothing 
more, and the self in making adjustments to this nexus 
is able to react upon it and change the form of its activity. 
The very life of the self depends on this dual relationship 
—it can adjust itself to conditions and can modify them. 


6Pp. 164-178. 


HEB ONA GUREIOR CLME SELLE 345 


(2) The laws of nature are man’s nearest approxima- 
tion to the expression of perfect objective order; and per- 
fect objective order, where the law of conservation holds, 
is the condition of freedom on the part of the self. (3) 
Freedom is not caprice in contravention of law; it is intelli- 
gent manipulation, it is the ability to change the course of 
events in accordance with a plan. ‘That this should be 
possible nature must be the realm of inexorable law. (4) 
But a “‘reign of law’’ in nature cannot mean that events are 
literally held together in a causal chain, if by causal we 
mean the activity of a mysterious physical force distinct 
from the events themselves and binding them together. 
The events as such disappear. All the resources of the 
physical universe are not sufficient to make one of them 
hold over into the next instant. (5) Hence the differ- 
ence between the conception of freedom advocated by 
Lodge, the scientist, and that which philosophy would 
defend grows out of the more thorough analysis by philos- 
ophy of the meaning and implications of such terms as 
natural law, causal connection, matter, force, energy, as 
applied to the world of experience. With these terms 
cleared of ambiguity, a belief in freedom as defined by 
philosophy seems to have the entire support of experience. 

The more we reflect on the interrelations between the 
finite self and the ultimate Power, a relationship infinitely 
close and sensitive, the more we appreciate what human 
interests must mean in the cosmic whole, how much man’s 
freedom in volition may accomplish. Do we, for instance, 
really influence the earth as a whole or the stars in their 
courses? We do not know; but we have a strong con- 
viction born of considerations we dare not set aside, that 
the stars would have no courses and the universe no on- 
goings, were it not for the Infinite’s purpose to develop 
spiritual beings, essentially like ourselves. Our free ac- 
tivity, then, is cosmic in ways that experience does not and 
perhaps never will reveal. Within experience our free- 
dom is considerable and beyond experience probably ex- 


346 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


tends with diminishing influence to the outermost reaches 
of the universe. 

From the viewpoint of philosophy the case for freedom 
seems to us conclusive. “The doctrine is shrouded in mys- 
tery for the intellect: it cannot be construed. But if we 
would catalogue whatever in our world cannot be intellec- 
tually construed, we should need to include every experi- 
ence that involves change—and what experience does not? 
The self and its free activity must be appealed to if we 
would get the slightest understanding of change. In deal- 
ing with change the intellect must translate it into change- 
less elements of a temporal series, Moreover all ultimate 
facts are mysterious; that is, nothing beyond them can help 
in their explanation. ‘The task of the reflective thinker 
is to find the well attested mystery that clears up all the 
other mysteries of experience and remains itself a mystery 
only because it is an ultimate fact. ‘The self as a free agent 
is such a mystery: it illuminates all other mysteries and, 
we may add, it is the only one that does. 

Before leaving the subject of freedom, we may say a 
word concerning the relation between freedom and creativ- 
ity. [he connection is obviously so close that where we 
find the one we are practically certain to find the other. 
A genuinely free act is essentially creative, since it involves 
making actual and existent what before was only a guiding 
ideal. Conversely the creative act can be referred to the 
self as its originator only if the self has sufficient power in 
itself to account for it. An act of blind impulse could 
hardly be thus referred. ‘The self, when acting impulsively 
or instinctively, is largely controlled from without. Prac- 
tically, then, if not also logically, freedom means creativity 
and creativity means freedom. ‘This conclusion can be 
maintained while recognizing the dependence of the self 
on the ultimate Power. When the self acts creatively it 
neither refashions a preéxistent raw material nor molds 
pure emptiness into forms of existence. The new crea- 
tion is a joint achievement—the self works in free codp- 
eration with the ultimate Power. In view of the fact that 


THE NA DORE*YOR THE SELF 347 


this codperation is an essential feature of all experience, 
we can ignore it as a differentia of freedom, and emphasize 
the self-originated ideal or purpose and its actualization 
in free volition. There is always a great temptation, as 
we have remarked before, to force the free act into the 
molds of conceptual thinking. But when the psycholo- 
gist tries—as did Hugo Miinsterberg in his Willenshand- 
lung—even to describe an act of volition, the best he can 
do is to trace the preparatory muscular adjustments and 
the subsequent muscular and neural releases together with 
the accompanying emotional states; he has not a word for 
the volition itself. “Thought-content may serve as guide 
to the self, but cannot perform the free creative act. 


It is usual to distinguish the creativity of finite selves 
from the creative acts of the ultimate Power, but the dis- 
tinction throws no light on the problem of how any- 
thing can come into being. In creating the cosmic uni- 
verse of changing conditions that make possible the life 
and well-being of finite selves, the ultimate Power evi- 
dently has resources that we do not possess. But this 
fact is only another aspect of the infinite mystery that en- 
velops the whole of experience. All that we need to 
maintain, in order to account for our part in the joint 
transaction of world-building is that we as selves are free 
and creative under the limitations that experience reveals. 


Of all the creative activity by the self, the apprehension 
of other selves and the social whole is the crowning attain- 
ment. It is here that the world of the self most nearly 
approximates the creativity usually ascribed to the infinite 
Being as his exclusive domain. We might not think it 
strange or beyond the powers of a finite self to construct, 
under the compulsion of stimulations, the physical world 
in so far as that world becomes known to the individual. 
This would seem from one point of view to be merely a 
case of following directions and reproducing an original 
that already existed in the divine mind. But when we 
have to account for the presence of other selves in our 


348 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


experience, we hesitate to draw the obvious conclusion. 
If we are correct in our analysis thus far, there is nothing 
for us to do but to push ahead and “go where reason 
leads,’’ just as Huxley thought he was doing. We know 
others before we know much about ourselves. ‘They dic- 
tate our conventional life in its broader aspects, produce 
for us our social values, humanize us, and bring us to 
the richer self-realizations. They constitute our life in 
so far as our main interests and activities are concerned. 
It would be difficult to overstate our dependence on so- 
ciety. 

How can another self come into our world and produce 
such changes in our innermost nature? ‘The only answer 
consistent with the facts is that another self in becoming 
a self for us is as much a part of our creative activity as 
is the rest of our experience world. ‘That the other self 
exists for itself apart from our knowing it is not now the 
issue. It is simply an interesting and highly significant 
fact which compels us to look upon selves as fundamen- 
tally different from all other forms of existence. But this 
in no way weakens the conclusion that selves, whatever 
they are for themselves, are for us who know them our 
own creation. In the act of apprehending another self we 
really produce a duplicate of our own self-activity in the 
body of the other self, while at the same time we make 
such changes in detail of expression as the facts of our 
experience require. We may describe this as a projection 
of ourselves into the body of another self; or we may call 
it Einfihlung or sympathetic rapport, or any other cur- 
rent expression, but nothing really explains it. The lack 
of explanation, however, need not prevent our seeing what 
takes place. As nearly as psychologists of selfhood can 
make out, the following aspects may be roughly distin- 
guished. 


On occasion of appropriate stimulations sufficiently 
complex and varied, the self responds, creating the other 
self or group of selves in the same way as it responds to 


WEIN A WO BO Bn Bash Lr 349 


the appropriate stimulations in getting an experience of 
physical things. The difference lies in the manifest fact 
that more of the apprehending self is expressed in the one 
case than in the other. It is literally a matter of more or 
less. . Whenever the self has occasion to respond to stimu- 
lations its first impulse seems to be to posit another self, 
and only when that is found to be out of harmony with 
the evidence does it modify its response by reducing the 
apprehended object to a lower type of existence. As the 
self passes down the scale of complexity in the stimula- 
tions, it learns to subtract more and more from its ideai 
of selfhood, till it reaches the limit of descent in the purely 
physical. “Thus it fashions its world with itself as a 
model. What is essentially different from the model is 
taken to be less than a self. We may generalize, then, 
with a fair degree of accuracy, and say that all construc- 
tive activity of a self in response to stimulation is as nearly 
a duplication of the apprehending self as the context of 
experience will warrant. 

We learn from experience that the tendency to attrib- 
ute selfhood to objects must be held in check, and in con- 
sequence we incline to interpret indications of intelligence 
in the sub-human with increasing care, lest we make our- 
selves ridiculous. Yet our judgment concerning animal 
life generally depends to some extent on whether our in- 
terest is scientific or sympathetic. If it is scientific, an 
attitude of detachment and objectivity is appropriate, 
since we seek such information as can be formulated in a 
general statement. “The influence of the scientific ideal of 
mechanism is also evident to some extent. Hence the 
tendency is to credit the animal with only the minimum 
of intelligence. Every evidence of essentially human char- 
acteristics is called in question and interpreted, as far as 
possible, on a purely reflex plane. On the other hand, 
when we become sympathetically attached, as in the case 
of a household pet, we seem to attain a more intimate 


350 FALE SEDER EN WhSi WORRIES 


knowledge of the animal’s nature. “The influence of the 
social ideal becomes evident. We incline to attribute an 
undue measure of human traits to our brute companions. 
We may talk to them as if they understood and were con- 
scious of what was going on in our own thought life; as 
if they had a sense of gratitude, shame, affection. Some 
carry this tendency to great lengths. In this field, how- 
ever, assertion is out of place. At least we must allow a 
wide range of difference in judgment. As we recede from 
the plane of the human, we know less and less of the ob- 
ject, for the sufficient reason that there is less to know. 

The temptation is to supplement knowledge. The 
tendency to read more into the evidence than a strictly 
critical attitude might justify is practically universal. All 
interpretation is upward until the human plane is reached. 
Social intercourse on the human plane is revelatory in both 
directions. Each person discovers in his fellow new com- 
plexities of nature, new depths of emotional life. At the 
same time, social life discloses to each individual more and 
more of himself. Under the stimulus of social life, each 
unfolds hidden potentialities of his nature. While selves 
are essentially alike, they differ widely in particular mani- 
festations. The differences in taste, interest, point of 
view, and capacity are multiplied by differences in actual 
experience. Hence in so far as we can enter socially into 
the lives of others, we draw out our own natures. This 
process is never complete, and there seems to be no limit 
within the span of life to the growing complexity of the 
results. 

We cannot fully know the self, for it grows through- 
out its career. “This commonplace remark should not be 
interpreted as meaning that all the self’s past is saved to 
it in the process. ‘The self passes from one form of ex- 
pression to another. ‘Thus every experience reveals some- 
thing of the inner nature. We are forbidden, therefore, 
to start with a preconception of the capacities and limita- 


Weleoi yeu Wey Oe ai eh otiele 0 9 351 


tions of the self, and in the name of this prejudice proceed 
to deny what experience may suggest or reveal of a vaster 
self. We should not be bound by the conception of self- 
hood given in unreflective experience. When we try to 
understand the self by taking into account all that it does, 
we find that we must think cosmically. The nature of 
the self as revealed at any moment in its unfolding must 
include not only the world as then experienced, but all 
that the self may at the time hope or fear or dream. This 
does not mean that the self is its world—a manifest error 
—hbut that it is all that is necessary to create such a world. 
‘The experienced universe, then, is the measure of the pres- 
ent self. If we would know all that the self is, we should 
have to take much else into account. The world of ex- 
perience is changing moment by moment. We are learn- 
ing more and more of our friends, making new acquaint- 
ances, getting new information about society and its mani- 
fold problems. All this must be reckoned as expressing 
the nature of the apprehending self. Besides we must con- 
sider that although the self forgets most of its doings, 
there is no telling when or under what circumstances the 
forgotten will come again before the self as a remembered 
experience. 

Furthermore both the capacity to remember and the 
variety of new experiences depend on conditions that are 
apparently inherent not in the nature of the self, but in 
the bodily organism. ‘The self, in other words, is limited 
in the range of its activities only externally, both as re- 
gards present experiences and those that are referred to the 
past and the future. ‘There is no real evidence that in any 
functioning of the self there is even an approach to a limi- 
tation from within. We become weary, but that is mani- 
festly physical; we soon reach the limits of our intellectual 
or volitional activity, but that too is traceable to the bod- 
ily conditions. A better brain, and we think better. “The 
better thinking is as easy as the other kind, when the 


52 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


physical conditions permit it. Give the body needed rest, 
and the capacity of the self is renewed. In short we never 
experience self-weariness or self-limitations; what seem to 
be such are all traceable to bodily functioning. This po- 
tential infinity of the self is not ordinarily appreciated. 
We are as a usual thing, and for our own good, immersed 
in the routine of life, and must first reckon with the com- 
monplace, before we can advance and get the larger vistas. 
We find ourselves in the measure that we find a world. 


CHAPTER IV. 
SPECIAL PROBLEMS OF SELFHOOD 


We enter now upon the discussion of special problems 
of selfhood. One of the most pressing of these problems, 
much discussed both by psychologists and by philoso- 
phers, is the relation of the self to the body, the ‘‘mind- 
body problem.’ It cannot be ignored by any serious stu- 
dent of selfhood. Even the behaviorist is forced to con- 
sider it before he can finally dispose of the self as any- 
thing other than the body in action. In fact few of his 
problems are so troublesome. He prospers so long as he 
moves on the plane of physics and psycho-physics, but 
whenever he has occasion to consider such psychic phe- 
nomena as perception, conation, evaluation, the mind- 
body problem becomes acute and he has no resources with 
which to meet it. The only course open to him is to sub- 
stitute for the psychic activities, forms of physical func- 
tioning. This deceives no one, not even the behaviorist, 
unless he considers that his methodological device yields 
not only scientific but also philosophical truth. The 
mind-body problem is really not so unmanageable if we 
start with the facts of experience and remain true to them. 
There is mystery here as everywhere else; but within the 
broad limits of the knowable we can find a fairly satisfac- 
tory theory. 

The self and the body are profoundly interrelated. 
Whatever the question concerning the activity of the self, 
the answer must recognize the part played by the body; 
whatever the issue concerning bodily functioning, no ex- 
planation can be final that ignores the self. The reality is 


353 


354 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


not the self nor the body, not even the self and the body, 
but the self body unity. If asked, What is the body? we 
might do worse than answer, It is the self as expressed in 
physical functioning. And if asked, What is the self? we 
might answer, It is that which is manifested in what con- 
stitutes for us the body. Heretofore we have been refer- 
ring to the self as if it might conceivably function apart 
from the body and in accordance with its own spiritual 
nature. “This assumption must now be either justified or 
discarded; we face the mind-body problem. 

That the self depends on the body is manifest. The 
effects of bodily injury, of malnutrition, disease, growth 
and decay, all indicate this dependence. On the other 
hand, the evidence that the body is conditioned in subtle 
ways by the self is not quite so unmistakable, though 
quite as abundant. Confusion arises when the living body 
in continuous contact with the self is not sharply distin- 
guished from the body after this connection has been sev- 
ered—the mass of slowly disintegrating material that we 
call the dead body. ‘The living body utilizes energy, re- 
places worn-out or deénergized tissue, carries on the com- 
plex activities involved in the maintenance of bodily 
structure and function, responds to emotions, passions, 
conations, and in a variety of ways reveals the controlling 
influences of the life principle. It serves as the sole 
medium of communication between the self and the outside 
world. It remains itself while continuously appropriating 
and discarding physical elements from the environment. 
In contrast the dead body is characterized by the absence 
of all these forms of activity. All that means organiza- 
tion, unity, sensitivity, responsiveness to psychic influ- 
ences, ceases with the passing of life from the body. 
Nothing is left but the discarded material that happened 
to constitute the physical elements at the moment of 
death. This has no conceivable connection with the self. 
Our problem is the connection between the self and the 
living body. ‘The vast literature on this subject witnesses 


SPECIAL PROBLEMS OF SELFHOOD 355 


to its continued interest. Psychology, psychoanalysis, ab- 
normal psychology—to mention no more—are largely 
devoted to it. We can attempt only general suggestions 
on the nature of the self as related to the body and the 
nature of the body as related to the self. 

Certain abnormal bodily functionings, such as the so- 
called automatisms, raise the question, Which is primary, 
the self or the body? The phenomena of dreams suggest 
the question whether the self may not under certain con- 
ditions detach itself from the body and temporarily, if not 
permanently, take on a different form of physical manifes- 
tation. ‘The rare experiences known as dissociation or 
dual (multiple) personality point to the possibility of the 
self being split up into several selves. Finally the facts of 
growth and decay are susceptible of more than one inter- 
pretation as to the permanence of the self. “These four is- 
sues—the primacy, independence, integrity, and perma- 
nence of the self—are philosophy’s chief concern with the 
mind-body problem. 

In studying automatisms, the scientist has rarely hesi- 
tated to make the body primary, and to treat the self as 
a mere accompaniment or even a mere name for the com- 
plex physical activities. If the mind shows abnormalities, 
the physician looks for a lesion in the body, some organic 
or at least functional trouble. But more and more inves- 
tigators of these maladies are coming to appreciate the 
subtle influence of mental conditions in the patient. The 
physician very correctly places the emphasis upon the 
physical maladjustments, for they can be directly studied, 
and the problem for him is one of effecting a cure. But 
when we would know what the facts under discussion 
signify as to the nature of the mind-body connections, we 
need to give special attention to the psychic elements. 
Can the facts be interpreted in harmony with the conclu- 
sions already reached as to the essential agency of the self 
and the essential passivity of the body? If so, this con- 
clusion must continue to hold against all rival theories. 
We believe we can do justice to all the facts concerned by 


356 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


maintaining that these physical maladies indicate an ab- 
normal functioning of the self: the power of self-expres- 
sion is impaired. The self may still, therefore, be looked 
upon as the active principle in the mind-body combina- 
tion. 

What have dreams to tell us? Is there any truth in the 
ancient superstition that the soul in dreams can leave the 
body and wander forth either bodiless or with an ether- 
eal, phantom body? ‘To ask such a question marks one 
as visionary and wanting in scientific acumen. We mod- 
ern folk are far removed from the crudities and credulities 
of primitive peoples, at least we believe we are. Never- 
theless certain well-known experiences of the dream con- 
sciousness are hard to explain on any other theory than 
that of spiritual detachment. The self seems in the dream 
to break away and roam at will while the actual body re- 
mains in one place. Whatever our final conclusion as to 
the meaning of these experiences, they cannot be brushed 
aside as of no significance. “They are rooted in the essen- 
tial nature of selfhood. The revival of interest in the in- 
terpretation of dreams following upon the researches of 
Freud, Jung, Adler, and others, makes our question seem 
less bizarre. “The psychoanalysts were at first satisfied to 
explain dream experiences as mechanical functioning of 
the bodily organism while under special tension. But 
the more carefully these dream experiences were studied, 
the more the self appeared as a determining factor. How 
far may we go in recognizing this dominance of the self? 
Can we accept the subjective evidence at its face value and, 
with certain religious sects, contend that the self may, un- 
der exceptional conditions, actually leave the body for a 
season? Evidently the theory is no more grotesque than 
the contrasting theory that the body itself does the dream- 
ing while the self is a figment of bodily activity. If we 
dared to believe that the self has this power of independ- 
ent action, certain doctrines of survival might be much 
more easily accepted. 


BePOCIALAPROBEEMS OR VSELRHOOD | 9357 


But we are not justified in such a belief, and for two 
principal reasons. (1) The belief implies that the self 
is a space-filling substance, capable of locomotion through 
space. This is tantamount to denying that the self is 
strictly and wholly an agent, for as agent it is non-spatial. 
(2) The dream experiences can all be accounted for in 
closer harmony with both the findings of psychology 
and the conclusions of philosophical reflection. We need 
only to recognize that the self is an agent, creating and 
modifying its experience world, and that in all its activi- 
ties it is under limitations which determine for it the struc- 
ture of its world. As limited the self must express itself 
in forms of activity that have a definite structure and 
mode of operation. In short, the self can give effective ex- 
pression to its inner life of agency only through a body. 
A self without a body would be ineffective, if indeed it 
could exist at all. On the other hand, the self thus lim- 
ited need not be attached to any particular group of physi- 
cal elements such as compose the body at any one time. 
It could not be so attached if it would; the anabolic and 
catabolic processes that mean the life of the body, judged 
from the objective side, preclude such a possibility. The 
body as the structure expressing the limitations of. finite 
selfhood remains, while the physical elements are ever pass- 
ing and being replaced. This manner of speech is in har- 
mony with the ordinary common-sense view of the physi- 
cal world. If we should express the thought more in ac- 
cordance with the results of our previous discussions, we 
should say that the body is merely the flowing expression 
of the self in manifesting itself to others and in producing 
changes in its experience world. The continuity and in- 
tegrity of the body is the continuity and organic char- 
acter of the self’s activity. “The movements of the body 
express the limitations under which the self works. 
When, therefore, the self passes through a series of dream 
experiences that seem to indicate a power of detachment 
from the body, we must conclude that it is manifesting its 
creative energy under a different type of limitations. The 


358 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


new dream type may well be called a dream body since it 
is effective in the dream world. But it ceases to be effec- 
tive when the self passes out of the dream state. In this 
sense the self may have as many bodies as it has dreams, 
but none of these bodies could belong to the phenomenal 
world. 

The phenomena of dissociation suggest that the unity 
and the integrity of the self can be disrupted or else that 
more than one self can occupy the same body. This raises 
the question of the self’s essential integrity. Under cer- 
tain conditions the self may apparently suffer such com- 
plete breaks in the continuity of its life that it seems to be 
quite another self. It can have a different set of interests, 
different modes of activity, different vocabulary, different 
memories. Everything that manifests selfhood may be 
different. These strikingly different groups of psychic 
phenomena may alternate at intervals and each represent 
a complete cycle of experiences. In extreme cases, neither 
‘‘personality’’ remembers the experiences of the other. Do 
these phenomena point to the conclusion that the unity of 
the self is a function of the body? or do they mean that a 
single body may successively function for numerically dif- 
ferent selves? One of the most subtle and effective attacks 
upon the primacy of the self in the mind-body combina- 
tion is the insistence upon the unity of the body in the 
phenomena of dissociation. “Though we do not know 
enough about these phenomena to dogmatize, we are free 
to suggest that they are susceptible of quite another inter- 
pretation. In fact, several other interpretations have been 
brought forward and defended. If the dissociation were 
complete and final, if no connections could be discovered or 
developed between the alternating personalities, the inter- 
pretation might possibly be that separate and distinct selves 
successively manifest themselves in the one body, each 
finding the physical system suitable to its nature. Under 
the conditions as stated, it would seem less reasonable that 
the original self had actually been broken up into two or 
more. But neither of these conceptions is quite satisfac- 


SPECIAL PROBLEMS OF SELFHOOD 359 


tory. As against the theory of a divided self we may urge 
that the self is not a space-filling organism capable of fis- 
sion. It is essential unity because it is pure agency and 
therefore not made up of parts that can be separated. 
From the physician’s point of view, the observed phe- 
nomena may mean literal dissociation, because for him the 
physical facts are the significant ones. “To the student of 
selfhood this view is simply impossible as a final explana- 
tion. Besides the close observer of the phenomena is al- 
most certain to discover subtle connections between the 
personalities, connections that may consist in subconscious 
mannerisms or in actual though vague recollections of each 
other’s experiences. It is the task of the physician to de- 
velop these connections until the two personalities blend; 
the patient is then pronounced cured. ‘These facts could 
mean that throughout the experiences of alternating per- 
sonalities the self remained itself, but because of physical 
conditions was compelled to manifest two sets of widely 
differing experiences. “That the self is capable of thus sim- 
ulating more than one personality is abundantly evidenced 
in the phenomena of dreams. It is also at least suggested 
by the sympathetic rapport of one self with a fellow self 
in society. Every self that we learn to know as another 
self is in a real sense ourselves manifested. “The main ob- 
jection to the other interpretation of the phenomena, 
namely, that different selves alternately inhabit the same 
body, is that selves do not occupy or inhabit a body, they 
manifest themselves in bodily form. 

The mind-body entity grows, matures, passes into sen- 
ility, and finally ceases to be. How may these facts be 
interpreted? “[hey may mean that the self grows as does 
the body, that it starts at the zero point of effective living, 
waxes with the increase of bodily vigor, and wanes with 
the weakening of the body. This is the ordinary inter- 
pretation, but it is open to certain obvious criticisms. For 
instance, the body as the manifestation of the self depends 
for its effectiveness on the organization and utilization of 
physical elements. What, then, appears as the growth 


360 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


and decay of the self is in reality the increasing or decreas- 
ing capacity of the self to dominate the physical modes of 
expression. It is well known that at any moment in the 
life of the self a sudden change may take place in its ca- 
pacity to exercise these prerogatives. [he excessive loss 
of blood, the effect of stimulants, the reception of deeply 
moving information or any one of many disturbing influ- 
ences may profoundly modify for good or ill the physical 
expression of the self. This physical expression depends 
for its efficiency and normality upon a certain balance and 
harmony of parts in the organization, a certain respon- 
siveness of function. This harmony may be so disturbed 
that the self misinterprets its experiences. Forms of de- 
mentia may result in which all expression seems awry. 
It is difficult to believe that the self as an entity fluctuates 
in these various ways; that on occasion it all but ceases 
to be, that, following a physical change, it augments its 
nature up to or above the normal; that with physical mal- 
adjustment it becomes itself deranged and demented, in- 
capable of normal functioning; and that this condition 
may .pass and the self become its true self again under the 
surgeon's knife. A belief in such utter dependence of the 
self upon the varying and unstable aspects of bodily ac- 
tivity is the more difficult when we take into account the 
qualitative complexity of the psychic life as compared 
with the qualitative monotony and simplicity of the dis- 
tinctively physical functionings. ‘The self overflows the 
physical at every point. 

But if we draw the conclusion that the self is not sub- 
ject to the same fluctuations of growth and decay as the 
body, we must meet manifest difficulties. Is the self full 
grown in infancy? Is it still in possession of all its inner 
psychic resources at the period of senility? Is the self su- 
perior to change? We are not prepared to answer these 
questions, we can only throw out tentative suggestions. 


1Cf. Bergson, Matter and Memory, Introduction, and Mind- 
Energy, vii.; also H. Wildon Carr, A Theory of Monads, chap. viii. 


SPECIAL RPROBEEMS Ob SELPHOOD | 361 


We are persuaded that the self is vaster, more complex, 
more enduring than any or all possible physical expres- 
sions of it. The physical expressions must be learned, 
they are in very truth only expressions. When by a clot 
of blood on the brain the intellectual and moral giant is 
reduced to imbecility in emotional and intellectual life, or 
when by the removal of the clot, he is restored to his orig- 
inal brilliant career, it is purely a matter of adequacy of 
expression. After certain lesions of the brain the patient 
on recovery must often re-learn the most ordinary physi- 
cal movements, such as walking, eating, speaking. This 
re-learning is manifestly a problem in mastering a method 
of the self’s expression. Whenever the self is forced out 
of harmony with one system of expressional conditions 
into another system, it must perforce learn the methods 
of the new set of conditions, and while doing so will seem 
to grow pati passu with the mastery of the new condi- 
tions. In other words, the self may on occasion have to 
learn a new set of physical reactions, new methods, new 
habits—the same self all the time, yet not the same, be- 
cause it cannot manifest itself so adequately. Over against 
these reflections we must place the fact that all the experi- 
ences of the self affect its inner life. It is never the same 
after as before a given experience. In this sense it is a 
growing entity. But growth of inner nature through suc- 
cessive experiences is quite a different thing from such 
identification of the self with the bodily activities as 
equates every variation of the physical capacity with a 
variation of selfhood. 

We may now sketch certain plausible conclusions from 
our study of the mind-body problem. (1) The self is 
always the agent expressing itself in bodily functioning, 
whether conscious and volitional, or subconscious and re- 
flex. Whatever distinguishes the living body from the dead 
body is a mode of the self’s expression. (2) The body 
is a living organism carrying on the complicated processes 
of anabolism and catabolism in the objectification of the 
self’s activities. It is for the self an intricate nexus of 


362 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


unique experiences, the locus of all sensations, the instru- 
ment of all thinking and conation, the condition of con- 
sciousness, the basis of all goods within the reach of the 
self. It is the mechanism of communication between 
selves. It measures the self’s capacity to modify its en- 
vironment. It exists for the self only as a part of the self’s 
constructed experience; it exists for other selves only as 
they too construct it in response to stimulations. (3) All 
abnormal phenomena in the life of the self must be inter- 
preted as deranged expressions of selfhood under the limi- 
tations of its finitude, though for obvious reasons they 
seem to originate in the physical organism. We can say 
the same of all normal experiences of the self; in so far 
as they reveal an orderly sequence and predictable charac- 
ter, they may be referred to the body as their source. But 
this reference of experiences to the body should be recog- 
nized as merely a matter of convenience. Otherwise we 
progressively distort the real nature of the situation. If 
we start with treating the body as the source of ordinary 
experiences, we tend to make the self only the mysterious 
background of psychic phenomena not yet explained. 
The self is thus in process of being eliminated from its 
own world. 

Certain interesting questions grow out of these conclu- 
sions. If it is true that the body is a mode of manifesta- 
tion on the part of the self and marks the limit of the 
self’s power to manifest itself, then we are close to tautol- 
ogy when we say that with a more facile brain one might 
think better, or with a more vitalized blood supply and 
firmer muscles and steadier nerves, one could accomplish 
more. But if a better brain means a better self and an 
injured brain a suppressed self, what of the statement in 
the last chapter that the self’s limitations are external to 
it? It is true that the body merely expresses the limita- 
tions and only the self has causative or ontological reality. 
The conditions, then, that control the self and circum- 

2 Cf. supra, p. 351. 


SPECIAL PROBLEMS OF SELFHOOD 363 


scribe the range of its activity are apparently not external 
to it; at least they do not emanate from the body. But 
in that case are they inherent? Do they pertain to the es- 
sence of the self? Must it be limited in order to be a self? 
‘The answer to these questions is that the self as we know 
it is limited, but selfhood is not. The idea of the self as 
agent does not involve any particular system of limita- 
tions. ‘These are matters of fact. As characteristic modes 
of response by the self to controlling stimulations, the 
bodily changes may vary through wide limits. They are 
not only evanescent but non-recurring, and hence bear the 
marks of being strictly adventitious. “The purely physi- 
cal functions are far from being the only forms of self- 
expression. We are cognitive beings with capacity to 
think, evaluate, and form purposes. “Thinking as an act 
of the mind contains no limitation within itself; that is, 
there is no reason in the nature of thinking why the finite 
self should not compass all possible knowledge. Know- 
ing the simplest fact is the same as knowing all things. 
Memory might be perfect instead of intermittent and 
weak. All the processes that enter into discovery and 
appreciation might conceivably be carried to such effec- 
tiveness as to compass the physical universe and penetrate 
the innermost secrets of the spiritual life. We might be 
able to appreciate all beauty, all meaning, all value. As 
for volition, nothing is easier, when the conditions justify 
the act. When we are once convinced that the thing de- 
sired can be obtained without undue effort, the volition 
wills itself, as it were. ‘The difficulties lie altogether in 
the objective conditions. Until certain inventions were 
perfected one could not actually will to ride in a motor 
car, but now for many people the volition to use such a 
conveyance is a mere routine. Willing the most insignifi- 
cant change is the same essentially as willing a universe 
into being. All the activities of the self above the plane 
of physical functioning are thus potentially limitless. 

We may conclude then that the bodily limitations 
might conceivably be other than they are without annull- 


364 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


ing the identity of the self. Whatever else it is, the body 
is a tool, an instrument of expression, a means of reach- 
ing and influencing other selves. As such it is not to be 
lightly esteemed. It is indispensable to our present mode 
of living. But that does not mean that it is the only 
possible way in which the self can express its nature. As 
finite the self must work under limitations of some sort, 
hence cannot exist without a body and an external world 
with which it must reckon. But the body as we know 
it might become other than it is with greatly enhanced 
powers, and the self would expand in its activities corre- 
spondingly. What this might mean is suggested by the 
fact that even a slight increase in brain power adds enor- 
mously to the possible range and richness of the spiritual 
life. We do not know what we shall be, for we know 
not what we are. 

Being finite the self is never in full possession of its 
potentialities. It not only must express itself in successive 
experiences, but is limited in the grasp and understanding 
of any given situation within its experience. It never 
can command all the resources of selfhood. Hence to the 
student of psychic phenomena the conception of a sub- 
conscious self has proved useful. The term covers not 
only the latent possibilities of the self, but also and more 
especially the wide range of psychic activities that do not 
ordinarily emerge into clear consciousness. It compre- 
hends the unexpressed life of the self, including the vital 
functions of the bodily organism, all reflex and instinctive 
activities, the processes in sense perception and intellection, 
the abiding effects of past experiences as tendencies and 
dispositions, and in short whatever in the conduct of the 
self is not at the time an object of consciousness. Most of 
the mental and conative functioning is not a matter of 
direct experience. Only the results come into clear con- 
sciousness. As James pointed out, we concern ourselves 
with the stopping places in thought rather than with the 
transitional features. “These termini of thought may seem 
fixed elements, given to the mind in their completed form, 


SPECIAL PROBLEMS OF SELFHOOD 365 


yet we know that they are reached only by a process, 
sometimes very complicated, and they continue to exist 
only as the constructive activity of the self sustains them. 
We need to enlarge our conception of the self to include 
whatever may at any time, under any circumstances, either 
emerge into consciousness or indirectly influence our con- 
scious life. The conception of the subconscious to cover 
the unknown and inferential is a great convenience. It 
invites us to investigate, it appeals as a terra incognita ly- 
ing close at hand. Moreover it satisfies the imagination 
when we do not need to be especially critical. “To its un- 
charted spiritual possibilities we can refer all our forgot- 
ten experiences, all our propensities, all the strange out- 
croppings of character, all impulses, aspirations, habit- 
tyrannies. It makes picturable the phenomena of multiple 
personality, it furnishes what may be needed to explain 
in an uncritical way telepathy, clairvoyance, and even 
divine revelation. How, forsooth, can the ultimate Will 
make its purposes known to man with infallible certainty? 
One might answer with James that it is by their break- 
ing through into the subconscious, where they take their 
chances of crowding above the threshold of consciousness. 
The conception of the subconscious is ideally adapted to 
support any crudity or vagary that may gain currency, 
concerning the nature of experience. It is the natural 
home of allerlet Schwarmeret. Hence we should be on our 
guard against its careless or uncritical use. Especially 
should we not be trapped by the notion that when a bit 
of conscious experience, say a perception or a thought-con- 
tent, drops below the threshold, it remains intact and es- 
sentially unchanged. We have no reason to believe that 
any experience whatever continues to exist in any sense 
when it ceases to be a conscious experience. As a store- 
house of experiences, the subconscious is pure fiction. At 
best it is a place of mystery reached for the most part by 
inference of doubtful validity. 

Other questions grow out of our discussion of the 
self as finite and conditioned but capable of indefinitely 


366 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


extending the range of its activities: If the finite self were 
fully realized, would it be less than infinite? Would it 
be longer opposed by a resisting power? Could it be 
conscious? Fortunately these questions do not need to 
be answered, since the possibility of the conditions being 
realized by any of us is so utterly remote. However we 
are at liberty to assume in a tentative way that whatever 
is essential to the fullest expression of selfhood may, in the 
course of time, be possible to the developing human self, 
though not of course in this life. We cannot conceive of 
what it would mean even to approximate the goal, but we 
know that the limitations under which we now live are 
mere matters of experience and far from necessary to self- 
hood. From the standpoint of selfhood, the limitations 
are the real mystery. We know that we as finite beings 
are selves in the making, but we do not know why we are 
limited in the particular manner revealed in experience. 
It is perfectly conceivable that we as selves should be able 
to retain our integrity and identity while passing, through 
zons of time, from one set of limitations (body) to an- 
other in widening ranges of activity, forever approximat- 
ing the goal of complete selfhood. On occasion of each 
fundamental change of environing conditions, we should 
probably need to learn a new method of self-expression, 
and thereby pass through stages roughly corresponding to 
the career of a human self in this present life. 

One reason given for believing that the ultimate Power 
is not conscious is that nothing can possibly exist in op- 
position to his will. Nothing, therefore, can test that 
will and compel it to consider. But this is pure specula- 
tion in the objectionable meaning of the term. It starts 
with a definition of the ultimate Power and then deduces 
what must be the relation of such a Being to finite and 
conditioned selves. But the only safe method of proce- 
dure is to study selfhood as partly revealed in ourselves. 
From the controlled character of our experiences we can 
pass inferentially to the nature of a being equal to exer- 
cising such control and thereby making the experience of 


SPECIAL PROBLEMS OF SELFHOOD 36/ 


a practically infinite physical universe possible to us. If 
we follow this ‘‘sure method of science’ and avoid unnec- 
essary hypotheses, we must recognize that the ultimate 
Power, though infinite, is confronted by the wills of all 
other selves. This of itself is enough to make and keep 
him conscious. He must be conscious if he is to manage 
the infinite nexus of environing conditions in such a man- 
ner as to realize the potentialities of finite selves. 

The self comes from mystery into being, and all its un- 
folding capacities root in mystery. [he best we can do 
is to follow with care the observable changes in its life 
history and draw tentative conclusions therefrom concern- 
ing its inner nature and possible destiny. Some light on 
special problems may come from a study of the sub- 
human realm, but always with the uncertainty attaching 
to an interpretation of what is confessedly not quite 
human by standards that are necessarily human, though 
these standards are hypothetically reduced to make them 
applicable. In this transaction sympathy helps, as it does 
in all interpretation, but this act of “‘reading in’’ has its 
drawbacks. Its lack of trustworthiness is indicated by 
the wide range of opinion concerning the degree and ex- 
tent of animal intelligence. 

Having considered the nature of the self as expressed 
in its physical and social environment, we have now to 
point out certain tentative conclusions concerning its rela- 
tion to other selves and to the supreme Self. “The discus- 
sion concerning the nature of the body led us to the asser- 
tion that whatever else it may be, the body serves as the 
means of communication between the self and other selves. 
All the results of our activity as affecting other selves begin 
with the movements of the body and are passed on to the 
nexus of physical conditions to be taken up and inter- 
preted by the other selves. “This is the observed course in 
all social life. 

The body, then, is the immediate instrument and the 
rest of the world the mediate instrument of communica- 
tion. From this point of view the universe consists of the 


368 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


ultimate Power and the community of selves who act 
partly on their own initiative and partly—-so far as they 
experience an objective common-to-all world—on the im- 
pulsion of this Power. Such a view seems to make of the 
body and the physical world generally a mere shell of con- 
ditions; but as we have seen, this is not true. If one 
should ask what else is included, the reply would be that 
the physical world—body and all—is just what it appears 
to be. We found that this solid earth was helpless to re- 
sist resolution into mere process except as its reality be- 
comes value-content. This conclusion reduces it to exist- 
ence for selves; it cannot be construed as anything more. 
Nowhere below the plane of living organisms can we find 
a trace of self-maintenance. Whatever exists in this realm 
is strictly “‘psychic content,’ or better, the controlled ac- 
tivity of the self. Its very reality depends on the finiteness 
of the self, that is, on the compulsion exercised over the 
self by the independent Source. Logically antecedent to 
the physical universe is a realm of selves, who by means of 
a complicated mechanism of conditions are able to com- 
municate with one another and form societies for mu- 
tual advantage. Society, then, is the fact for which the 
physical world exists. We might express the conclusion 
in another way by saying that the selves are the causal, the 
ontological reality; the physical realm is the evidence that 
they have found a way to communicate with one another 
and to maintain themselves. 

In one sense the individual self is the unit; in another, 
society; in still another, the entire universe as it presents 
itself to the individual. So necessary is society to the 
individual that we cannot see how anything more than 
the most rudimentary existence would be possible without 
the social contact. Even in elementary sense perception 
the apparent independence of the object involves the appli- 
cation of the social test. “The term objective means 
common-to-all. From this most elementary functioning 
of the self through the entire range of experiences, every 
stage is subject to the social test. “This is illustrated by 


SPECIAL PROBLEMS OF SELFHOOD | 369 


the way a hermit, separated from his kind, makes pets of 
animals and endows them with essential humanity. 

The persistent social reference of all self-activity gives 
a peculiar individuality and quasi personality to society. 
When human beings are studied in the aggregate and social 
bonds are considered in the abstract, society takes on the 
form and significance of a super-individual self with 
powers, impulsions, tastes, and destiny all its own. Not 
much training is needed in the art of reifying abstractions 
to conclude that the real is not-the individual selves, but 
society asa whole. It is then in place to talk of this 
mysterious personality as the Divine Nature or as the 
“Beloved Community’’ or as essential Humanity. The 
temptation is great. In the first place, this theory has 
the support of a striking analogy. Just as the objects of 
our sense world lose their apparent independence as soon 
as we note the connections that bind them together, so 
the individual selves may seem entirely disparate until we 
give due weight to social influences. Carrying this an- 
alogy through to its logical outcome, we seem to get light 
on many troublesome problems of selfhood. Instead of 
having to stop with the idea of a multiverse of separate 
individuals, each an irreducible entity—an idea obnoxious 
to the intellect—-we may now find relief in the theory 
that the knowable world constitutes a universe in which 
all individuals are but changing aspects and the whole is 
a harmonious system. In satisfying the intellectual de- 
mand for ultimate unity, the theory furnishes an adequate 
basis for the thriving science of sociology. Psychology 
also inclines to welcome it as being in line with the 
scientific need to reduce psychic life to a series of phenom- 
ena. Furthermore the religious value of the theory is 
considerable, especially to those who put their trust in 
mysticism. If society and not the individual self is the 
real unit, the way is open to conclude that the ultimate 
Power is the infinite Socius in whom all individual selves 
find their destiny. Theologians of a speculative bent have 
reveled in such a conception, and philosophers have found 


370 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


it a haven of rest from their perplexities. But the value 
of the theory is fictitious and its support in experience is 
vaporous. There is really no evidence whatever that 
society is anything more than the aggregate of discrete 
selves who have the unique power of influencing one an- 
other. The analogy of physical things vanishing into 
dynamic connections, we have long since learned, is utterly 
misleading. Asa speculative way out of perplexities, the 
theory is a complete failure. ‘This need not be dwelt 
upon after our study of pantheism and its fatuous nega- 
tions. The integrity of the self is at stake. We must 
steadfastly hold to an individualism of the most pro- 
nounced sort, if we would resist the alluring fallacy of 
exalting society into a reality distinct from its members. 
But the individual unit is the social, not the centripetal 
self, 

Just what do we mean by the social self? A summary 
answer would include the following items: (1) that 
the self comes into consciousness in experiencing other 
selves; (2) that the world of values is largely social in 
origin and significance; (3) that society is literally an 
expression of the apprehending self’s own nature; (4) 
that the realization of the social self is bound up with 
the realization of society; and (5) that the will to realize 
the ideal of society is the same ultimately as the will to 
realize the social self. “This brings us to the much 
discussed conception of the Kingdom of Selves. 

This Kingdom as an ideal becomes an experience to the 
self who lives for its realization. ‘The literal truth of this 
statement is seen when we reflect that society is for each 
self an objectification of its own nature, concreting its 
social interests and purposes. In a very real sense we see 
in those about us what we will that they should become, 
This ideal of them is the controlling influence of our lives 
in so far as we come into contact with them. Our ideal 
of society is its reality for us. If, for instance, we are 
willing to remain passive as regards social betterment, we 
incline to form a conception of society on the plane of its 


SPECIAL PROBLEMS OF SELFHOOD 37] 


lower average of expression. A relaxed attitude toward 
its welfare tends to make the less significant and desirable 
aspects dominant in our thought. We excuse ourselves to 
ourselves for our indifference and lower the moral quality 
of our living. We are drawn downward in our tastes, 
interests, purposes, by the phases of society that we toler- 
ate but do not try to improve. If, on the other hand, we 
devote ourselves to the upbuilding of society, the ideal for 
which we strive becomes identified with all that is best in 
society. Its latent possibilities—-what we see that it is 
capable of becoming—constitute our actual social environ- 
ment. Hence not what society is as seen from the stand- 
point of the onlooker, but what it means for us as an 
object of endeavor, is of paramount significance in our 
self-development. We can make it mean, so far as we 
are concerned, all that we would have it become, if we 
concentrate on its realization. By doing so we become 
members of the Kingdom for which, in its perfect realiza- 
tion, the whole creation waits. The self then comes to 
itself in creating society. Whatever it learns about people 
or any other part of its environing universe is self- 
expression. But how can a self create society? Is not 
this an extravagant claim based on a confusion of knowing 
and being? No. ‘The question itself involves the con- 
fusion. We have no occasion to consider what society is 
apart from its apprehension by the several selves that con- 
stitute it. [here is no such metaphysical entity; it exists 
only in and for its members. Society is what it is “‘ex- 
perienced as,’ to use James’s expression. We are 
considering it because it helps us to know what the self is. 
It reveals the self as bewilderingly complex, akin to the 
Infinite. 
Whatever the self is, its complete dependence on the 
ultimate Power must be assumed. This relation of de- 
pendence cannot be construed; it cannot be intellectually 
grasped. From whatever angle we approach the subject, 
we confront mystery. If, with many, we try to formu- 
late a theory of this dependence after the analogy of the 


ia? HEU SEER sEN Saw RIED 


relation of human beings to their thought creations, we 
run imminent danger of reducing the finite self to a mere 
thought of the Infinite. Or if we try to envisage the 
connection as of part to whole, the selves become frag- 
ments, temporary phases, mere effluxes of Deity, to be 
cancelled in due time, perhaps to be absorbed or trans- 
muted. But if with less imagination and more 
intellectual penetration, we think of human beings as 
essentially divine in nature though temporarily compressed 
within the bodily organ, we seem to explain both finite- 
ness and self-consciousness. ‘To be finite would be to live 
in a body subject to bodily conditions. Self-consciousness 
would be the turning of the self back on itself when it 
must face difficulties. The theory seems to provide also 
for such aspects of experience as the sense of freedom, the 
possibility of knowledge, and the temporary loss of 
consciousness, in swoon or sleep. Freedom could be 
represented as quite consistent with absolute dependence, 
for it would be merely self-dependence. Knowledge 
would be our birthright even though carelessness or 
physical limitations might cause us to fall into error. 
Sleep would be dependent on physical conditions. Con- 
sciousness, being an expression of our finite status, would 
be suspended whenever bodily functioning was impaired 
in certain ways. 

But this theory is open to serious criticisms. While 
seeming to exalt personality, it really does the opposite. 
Personality is made a mark of finitude, to be abolished 
when the spirit leaves the body. Whatever is most 
characteristic of the self as we know it must be looked 
upon as strictly temporary. All values in so far as they 
depend on conscious evaluation must be denied perman- 
ence. ‘This leaves nothing worth mentioning in our 
world of value. The identity of the self could not 
survive such a degradation. [he theory seems to depend 
for its appeal on the conception of an infinite plenitude 
of resources which each self may share because it is a part 
of the whole. But to give up belief in the self’s per- 


SPECIAL PROBUEMS OF SELFHOOD’ '373 


manence and the continuity of consciousness and the 
conservation of all values as we know them is too great a 
price to pay for a merely formal explanation in which 
no aspect of experience is really accounted for. It sets 
before us the picture of the infinite Intelligence limiting 
itself for no conceivable reason and enduring the conse- 
quences—self-imposed consequences—that might with 
perfect ease have been avoided, only to have the suffering 
and striving and remorse and spiritual unrest cancelled 
by the very Being that had compelled itself to endure the 
misery and degradation. From the point of view of the 
theory all moral aspiration is as ineffective as moral 
wallowing. So long as the divine game of self-deception 
lasted, there would inevitably be a certain amount of evil 
to endure; but when the game was over, all this would 
be transmuted. 

We really have no light on this subject of finite depen- 
dence, and must refuse to follow speculations in their 
vague wanderings. Our only recourse is to take life as 
it reveals itself to us and make such inferences as seem 
to help to insight and intellectual satisfaction. The facts 
of experience teach us that the finite self is free, yet 
limited; that it may blunder, yet find ways of correcting 
its false conclusions; that it can adjust itself to its environ- 
ment in such a way as to make considerable progress 
toward a larger life; that it has sufficient value in the 
sight of its Creator to justify a hope that it may continue 
to live after it departs this life; that it may live in such 
close communion with its Creator as will bring to fruition 
its highest aspirations. But to see that experience actually 
does suggest these conclusions, we need to think beyond 
the surface of ordinary routine and formulate for ourselves 
a world-view that will do justice to all phases of life. To 
stop short of such a view is to rest in a distorted, unsatis- 
factory conception of both the finite self and the ultimate 
Source of being. 

It is not easy to be thoroughgoing in our intellectual 
life and at the same time hold steadfastly to the plain 


374 THE SELF IN ITS WORLD 


teachings of experience. [he overweening influence of 
the ideal of system is the source of nearly all our difficul- 
ties. The intellect can make nothing of creativity or 
freedom or value, except to reduce them to something 
essentially different. It is because of this that we have 
such a plenitude of purely verbal explanations. One of 
the lessons of our investigation into philosophical thinking 
is the advisability of living without a theory on many 
subjects of controversy. The spiritual release from 
theories that do not explain is worth all it costs. Yet we 
should always be open to new light and eager to test 
every new suggestion. By holding steadfastly to the 
conclusions already attained, we can get suggestive hints 
as to our relation to the ultimate Source of our being and 
of our destiny in Him. ‘The religious conception of the 
Fatherhood of God, when interpreted in the light of the 
whole of experience, gives us the most satisfactory view 
of God’s relation to human selves. This view carries 
with it a fairly convincing argument for belief in a future 


life. 


INDEX 


AMbsDiuten TDL. cl 5 a iy 
PSB 297 i. sO OST: 
Absolutism, 129 f., 132, 150 ff., 
V5 Oo el 7 ih. 
Wbstraction;) |) tallacy 4, of,))\75, 
100 ff. 
Activism, 167 
Adler, 356 
fEsthetic— 
judgment, 195 ff. 
norms, 198, 200 ff. 
Values a) Pol ae 19 1) fe; 
324. 
Agnosticism, 7, 136, 187 f. 
Alexander, S., 47, 99, 133, 135, 
p39 01s The, 
Altruism, 220, 227 
Analysis) ot 0,197 £2,599 f.,° 107; 
Taf 1607 165 f5)1:70,)203 


1G LAAN te 


2/O0its) 


Animal oworld;, 105, 260°f., 
349 f., 367 
Anselm, 250 
Peopeatance,./7.4,. 1195. ff, 172 £., 
295 To 1 | 
Art— 


contrasted with practical inter- 
estspn 95 f., 201 f. 
distinguished from philosophy, 


Lyf; 
norms of, 198, 200 ff. 
AUthOriTyy oe 95) LL Asa thes 
245 ff. 


Automatisms, 355 f. 


Bacon, Sir F., 188 

Baillie, J., 294 

Beauty, 17 f., 191 ff. 
Behaviorism, 147, 290, 353 


Belief, 188, 214, 240 f., 245 ff., 
262 

Beloved Community, 265, 305, 
369 ff. 

Bentham, J., 217 

Bergson hia O OO) Vos. likey 
280 Teaiolo We oe) os 60 

Boas, G., 147 

Body 967351) £.4095 3.8. 

Bosanquet, B., 153, 158, 
294, 299 ff., 304 


167, 


Bowne, BY Pate 7) 2594/0308, 
312 

Bradley Peri) 797135, 0l 530m. 
EGG TGR PUL O OE eI 25g, 


294 ff., 300, 304, 322, 328 
Brine oo Uri roo Lf, 
364 
Brightman, E. S., 308 
Broad G25. 508 


Calculus, moral, 216 
Calkins, M. W., 167, 294, 308 
Correia Wacol toy) S08 7322, 


360 

Carniter be rl o os 

Categorical imperative, 220f., 
229 

Mategoriess wea 7oiriiirilso LAL 
MEE ede lL 


Causation; 60,)63 f., (98 £.,.°171; 
S50 Tis 339, O42, O4> 
Centers of activity, 57, 60, 149 
@hanves 639 60-1478 176. £., 
270 ges 2 9) fi 3 4. 46 
Character, 330, 338'f, 
Choicesealoduty 20 Sita, 220i. 
DT lh Ladin to Aeee 


375 


376 


Civilization, 179 f., 185 
Clifford, W. K., 284 


Cognitive values, 181, 184 ff., 
270 ff., 324 

Comic, 191, 206 

Common sense, | ff., 58, 85 ff., 


92,96. 14750150 
Comprehensiveness, 152 
Concept, (62.0 108; 100 le 292i, 

310 
Concrete, 8 f., 173 
Conscience, 215, 220 
Consciousness, 167, 283 ff., 302, 

307,93 14.5316 1372 
Consensus gentium, 244, 247 
Conservation of energy, 343 ff. 
Consistency, 116, 152, 174, 320 
Contradiction) (2) )57 5295 8:; 

298, 310 
Codperation— 

in economic world, 236 f., 265 
of self with Source, 31 ff., 40, 
TOOT OF MO Zoo Nee to, 

346 f. 

Copernicus, 11 


Cosmological argument, 249 ff., 
253 £. 

Creativity, 19 Lik, SAAT) 
335 ff., 346 ff. 


Creeds, 214, 245 f. 

Critical regress, 11 f. 

Croce B Oibo3iio) 96.0704 
Cyrenaicism, 216 


Darwin, 11 

Deathy105) 123259295, 4261 oF 

Degrees of reality, 156 f. 

Dependence, 333 ff., 371 ff. 

Descartes, 250 

Description, 114 f., 117 ff. 

Determinism, 235: 329 ff., 
BS7iE: 

Disorder, 112 

Dissociation, 355, 358 f, 

Dogmatism, 29, 132 


INDEX 


Douba le7 fa i ilaeeeos 


Drakes 

Dream: world; 43) 453555) 07 & 
140, 355 ff. 

Duration, 86 f., 98, 287, 315 ff., 
Gipea 


Durkheim, E., 243 

Duty, (215 02S ore 

Dynamism, 30 f.,) 59,259,095) 
113 1 20262 oe 


Eckhart, Meister, 160 
Eddington, A. S., 46 f. 
Effluxes; «29.f.. 159395 72 
Ego-centric predicament, 134 
Egoism, 85, 217, 220, 227; 239 
Einfuhlung, 194, 348 
Einstein, A., 46 f. 
Electrons, 95, 101, 113, 313 
Emerson, R. W., 203, 283 
Emotions, 17 f., 90f., 198 ff., 
213, 238, 240, 340 
Empiricism, 29 f., 281 ff. 
Environment, 70f., 109, 225, 
Boe ithe 
Epiphenomenon, 226, 284, 341 
Error, 35 £2°139 £4289 toe 


ay 
Essence, 108, 143°h.fe190t) 
169, 188, 274 


Ethics, 208 ff., 339 
Bvil, 105.9233) f..249 4275 oe 
Evolution, 104, 110, 262, 280, 


286 f. 

Experience, 10 ff., 50, 82, 86, 
94,106,132, 163 faa 
175,249, 122.6 cole 
CH be Byes Me 

Explanation, 64 ff., 102, 275 f., 
310f., 346 


Externality, 114f., 168, 313 f. 


Faith, 128, 240 ff. 
Fantasy, 41, 101, 192 ff., 327 
Fite, W., 227 


INDEX 


Force. 05 ff.) 100227516), 307 
Fourth dimension, 46 
Mreedom, 1255232 £.; 
324, 328 ff., 
344 ff., 372 
Freud, S., 356 
Fullerton, G. F., 228 
Functionalism, 290 f. 


SOG, 
338 ff., 


Given, the, 31 
God— 
aeecelfeu 4s ocl Oates 5 ie, 
e618 Rp Ar As BOVEY OD Loe BT 
as limited, 256 f. 
as non-moral, 256 


Fatherhood of, 263 f., 266, 
374 
Wi Ores 1 + £51240) 205. 2745 
304 
Goethe, 193 


Good, highest— 
adaptability of, 213 f. 
a principle of organization, 
ZLOVE. 
as God’s will, 214 f. 
as good will, 220 f. 
as life according to reason, 220 
as pleasure, 215 ff. 
as self-realization, 221 ff., 280 
definiteness of, 213 f. 
inclusiveness of, 212 f. 
Greek philosophy, 29 f., 60, 151, 
216, 220 
Growth, 214f., 306, 
Ol fee 55) 55:9) fF. 


S18 f7, 


Habite 259523947 041 

Haeckel, E., 284, 343 

Harmony,  preéstablished, 81, 
139 f. 

Hedonism, 215 ff., 222 f. 

Pee 14, 97, 152-6, 
Zo? fr: 

Heracleitus, 60 

Herbart, 2, 182 


250, 


BAN 


Heredity, 259 f,, 338 f. 
Heresy, 241 

Peks Gru. L335 
History, 14 ff. 

Hocking, W. E., 308 
Hodgson, R., 284 f. 
Hocffding, H., 239 

Holt) babe 1335 
Humanity, 238, 244, 369 
Fumes 25 lok. 
Huxley, T., 97, 210, 348 


Idealism, absolute, 129 f., 132 f., 
PID ESILGGO EL Pe Tree 1) 
291 ff. 

Illusion, 54, 74, 79, 88, 139 ff., 
LO Osea GY ule 20 bf 


Imagination, 41, 94f., 191 ff., 
201 ff. 

Immediacy, 159 ff., 168 

Immortality, 234, 261 f., 292, 
374 

Imperative, categorical, 220 f., 
229 

Independence, 31 ff., 42, 55, 87, 
94 f., 134 ff., 148 f., 
t6eT, 

Individualaw7 ff:: 7.3 ftw 176 ff., 
300, 304 


Individualism, 227 ff., 236 f. 
Inference, 101 f., 253 


Intellectualism, Go tis. Z20; 
ZOUMP ALS AN a O Ect :, 
DO 399, ,4 

Intelligence, 103 ff., 253 ff., 349, 
367 

Internality, 114 f., 168, 313 f. 

Interpretation, 14 ff., SL; 


U7 8246019502367 
Intuitionism, 164 f., 218 ff. 


JAMESON OF 2.0) 26D. f.,:305; 
371 

Jones, Sir H., 167 

Judgment, 78 f,, 173 

Jung, 356 


378 


Kant 3173363 ):69) wat oaseeo 2, 
LO 2220 fie ee 2 OT, 
ZS 285t 9 Pate 

Kelvin, Lord, 58 

Kingdom— 

of God, 265 
of selves, 370 f. 

Knowledge, 12 f., 27 ff., 106 ff., 
132, 164 f., 184 ff., 310 ff., 
De Ae iin Rat 


Ears oS 

Langfeld, H. S., 194, 197 

Law seenatural, “LOS ity oue 4 ts 
266)f., a4) 

Leuba, J. H., 240 

Libido, 238 

Lipps, T., 194 

Literature, 16 ff., 201 

Locke, 30 

Lodge, Sir O., 343 ff. 

Topic. We 6 a5 6 Ait Dio 27, 

Lovejoy, A. O., 133 

Loyalty,2253)230;258, 272 


Macrocosm, 107, 342 f. 

Magic, 244 

Mana, 243 

Manifold of sense, 30 f., 291 

Mansel, sHi it, 2253! 

Marvin, W. T., 132 f. 

Materialism, 25, 343 

McTaggart, J. M., 256 

Meaning, 119°.) 109,175 

Mechanism, 124i) 27 byt 3 2 
B34. f(OAL fui 44. f 

Memory, 49 f., 54, 104, 141 f. 

Metaphysics, 13, 136, 145, 148, 
153,329 

Mill.4i.up. 21/7: £, 

Mind, 30 ff., 40 ff., 
LOCO We. hoo tes 
107, 287 

Mind-body problem, 301, 324, 
309 fi, 


SET AROZ: 
94 f., 


INDEX 


Monadism, 81 
Monism, 300 f. 
Montague, W. P., 133, 314 
Moore}, G. Es, 133; 1374s 
Moral— 
argument, 250, 256 ff. 
calculus, 216 
obligation, 215, 218, 229 
scepticism, 212, 237 
test in religion, 270 ff. 
universe, 258, 267 ff. 
values, 181 f., 208 ff., 270 f., 
324 
Minsterberg, H., 347 
Mystery of selfhood, 312, 328, 
339, 346, 366 f. 
Mysticism, 129 f., 149, 158 ff., 
164 ff., 172, 369 


Nature, 69: ff.) 72.401 09 sae 
248, (257 £4 260 fee2oonr 
334 f. . 

Necessity, natural, 266 f. 

Nescience, 132, 327 

Newton, 46, 324 

Nominalism, 76 

Norms, esthetic, 198, 200 ff. 

Number, 67 ff., 75 

Nunn; TP. 133 1Se also 


Object, external, 28 ff., 34, 37 ff., 
415 77; 1087814 
Objectivity— 
as the common-to-all, 368 
as trustworthiness, 178 
contrasted with subjectivity, 2, 


10, LIZ 1977 200m 
213 ff.) 266 52)" eerie 
S22 fae 


of value, 173, 178, 208 ff. 
prejudice, 298 
Obligation, moral, 215, 218, 229 
Obscurantism, 214, 241 
Ontological argument, 


2D 2; 


249 Es 


INDEX 


Girderm 103-f., 
wef .49> } 

Organisms, 70f., 368 

Ostwald, W., 307 


RE fet ee oul es 


Palmer, G. H:,' 197, 207 
Pantheism, 151ff., 168, 370 
Perevert loo LaLa 
Personalism, 130, 167, 274 


Peteonality; 9205; "300, 355, 
Se AE PA ee 
Pessmism, 250i bia 257) 261 
Philosophy— 
as interpretation, 14 ff., 
17st, 291 


as practical, 24 f. 
as world-view, 7 f., 20, 24 ff. 
criticism of, 19 ff., 26 
defined, 1 ff., 5 ff., 24 ff., 190 
distinguished from art, 17 f. 
distinguished from common 
sense, | ff. 
distinguished from history, 
14 ff. 
distinguished from literature, 
Portt, 
distinguished from science, 
iret lot, U7 ff: 
distinguished from theology, 
Le 7. 
subjective viewpoint of, 10 ff., 
117 ff., 342 
validity of, 19 ff. 
value of, 23 ff. 
Pitkin; WwW. BS 133 
Pleasure, 215 ff. 
Positivism, 7, 130 
Potentiality, 99, 319, 
350 ff., 364, 367 
Power, ultimate, 14, 104 f., 245, 
BO ss Oe Oo fh, eons 
pao iti, 3969 f., 3/71 ff: 
Pragmatism, 116 
Bratton.) >, 143 f£., 240 


Seo eihas 


379 


Prayer, 264 ff. 

Prince, M., 233 

Pringle-Pattison, A. S., 167, 308 

Process, 24, 88 ff., 124 ff., 152, 
L69)7293 3/333 4223.08 

Psychoanalysis, 94, 238, 355 f. 


Psychology, 27, 29, 74, 165, 
DISH LOR LO ns 200% 
289 0348; (99951369 

Puffer, E. D., 195 

Purpose .69f iz s iy Zon. 
345 ff. 


Quality, 2s Oy an Loni 79: 
L2O W128 TAS bait 
218 f. 

Onantitye 67 teh 20. 2b Bie, 


Rashdall, H., 256, 308 


Rationalism, 129, 150, 164 ff., 
22025 O29 Tie OL a: 
LOS 23 


Rationality as value, 79, 172 f. 


Realisnien7 67) 129i oa Vi loo: 
LGAs Elie zee 
Reality— 
esthetic, 201 f. 
as experience, 132, 170, 
| EPAOAS SP SAAS fla hn aioe gy JP 
as extra-intellectual, 152 f., 
293 


as extra-scientific, 5f., 88 ff. 

as growing, 113, 370 ff. 

as interpretation, 119 ff. 

astiifenro lia 2 

as meaning, 168 f. 

as» process;) 1Z01f?, 152,169 

as value, 120 ff., 168 ff., 
L717 3308 

degrees of, 156 f. 

for mysticism, 161 f. 

of sense world, 72 ff., 161 f., 
L Ooty 


of space, 44 f, 


nan 


380 


of time, 53 f. 
of universals, 
151 
Regress— 
critical, 11 f. 
infinite, 337 
Relativity, 46 f. 
Relations, theory of external, 134, 
163 
Religiou— 
definitions of, 239 f. 
moral test of, 270 ff. 
of humanity, 244 
primitive, 242 ff. 
Religious values, 
324 
Remorse, 230, 329 
Responsibility, 259 f., 338, 343 
Rogers, A.2K 133 
Royee) 0.9) 000155; 0158 1075 
2943028 22319 
Russell BV) 3o.b aout er Oat. 


7D faye Osh 


LS2 cen SO 4b. 


Santayana, Gs 1728.51.35 )0b45 mh: 


188, 196 

DeePEicisime ts OF LO dic amoe, 
VATE LAS ie 5 Oa Oe 
1LS7if.)) 237,249 

Schiller, F. von, 192 f. 

Science— 

asvabstracts J .ticr oven Lees 

1:25 


as creator of values, 24, 177 ff. 

as description, 10, 114, 117 ff. 

as organized knowledge, 
106 ff. 

as partly extra-scientific, 
LS, 

gsupracticaly 7 ified Vee Poul Gitte 

as value scheme, 173 f., 177 f. 

distinguished from philosophy, 
As fe be ies 

ideal of, 168 f. 

its results external, 114 f. 

pot concerned with freedom, 


Cine 


INDEX 


Self— 


SS 2:63 9 10ers 

objective viewpoint of, 10, 
VES tie 

and body, 96, 351 f., 353 ff. 

as. | agent,’ \ 29'L) ff aaeea eer 
S113 23 fi 33 See 
361 

as appearance, 311 


as centripetal, 227 f., 231, 370 


as 
as 


as 


as 
as 


as 


as 
a 
as 
a 
as 


a 


i) 


as 


as 
a 
as 


”n 


as 


a 


mn 


as 
as 


as 
as 
as 
as 


changing, 318 f., 359 ff. 


conditioned, 306, 321, 
333 ff," 339 fie oo 
EV ATS y 
consciousness, 167, 283 ff., 
302 ff. 
core of being, 296 

creative, 324 ff., 335 ff., 
346 ff. 

evaluator, 116 ff., 209, 
IAG i? Bs i 


experience, 295 f., 322 
feeling, 296, 299 

free, 306 f:, 324,037 oun 
implicate of change, 276 ff. 
implicate of external world, 
276 

implicate of 
278 £. 
implicate of value, 279 f. 
infinite, 302; 321, 363/f: 
key to problem of causa- 
tion, 102 


orderliness, 


life-plan,- 302 fase 
3:19 f24322 
manifested in the world, 
255 PaAPSe: 


monad,, 295,44 30234150) 
mystery, 312; ) 328, yoa9, 
346, 366 f. 

non-consistent, 320 
non-spatial, 312 ff. 
observer, 28 

social, 227 ff., 248, 299 f., 
370 


INDEX 


as standard of interpretation, 
eof: 

as subconscious, 364 f, 

as substance, 321 

as synthesizer, 313 ff. 

as system, 297 f. 

as time-transcending, 99 f., 
Sb ft. 

as unique, 324 f., 348 

asLunity; 13.1.) 321 

as where it acts, 315 


central position of, 273 ff., 
302 

contemporary theories of, 166, 
ZEGsILOLEs 

implied in interpretation, 
118 ff. 


in xsthetic appreciation, 191 ff. 

in empiricism, 281 ff. 

in idealism, 166 ff., 291 ff. 

in mysticism, 168 

in psychology, 283 ff., 289 f., 
301 

in realism, 167 f. 

knowledge of, 310 ff. 

nature of, 309 ff. 


permanence: of, 319 ff.,.355, 
Lek. 

potentialities of, 319, 350 ff., 
364 ff. 


viewed objectively, 318 ff. 
Self-consciousness, 264, 302, 372 
Self-determination, 338 f. 
Selfhood— 
integration of, 264 f, 
problems of, 353 ff. 
Self-realization, 175, 221 ff., 319 
Self-sacrifice and self-denial, 223, 
227 f30 251 
Sellars, R. W., 133, 144 
Sensa, 30, 59, 281 
Sense organs, 27 ff., 93, 96 
Sense perception, 27 ff., 
meee 2 1. 13.5, 
276 ff, 


Cait 
148, 


381 


Sensibles, 137 f. 

Sheldon, W. H., 314 

Sidgwick, H., 218 f. 

NOCIELY 4.227 250 fi 256k 


ZAG F929 9 Ae LOS A290 f 
337, 347 f., 368 ff. 
Sociology, 369 
Socrates, 151 
Solipsism, 80, 127, 133, 136, 


140, 148, 263 
Sorley, W. R., 167, 308 
Source of stimulation— 
as causal, 33, 92 ff., 101 ff. 
as conscious, 366 f. 
as force, 100 f. 


as independent, 33, 42, 86 f.. 
168 


as intelligent, 103 ff., 253 ff. 
as knowable, 84, 101, 253, 
279 


as non-spatial, 33, 97 ff, 
as space-time, 99 
as substance, 97 f., 100 
as time-transcending, 98 
as unitary, 97f., 102 ff. 
not the object, 31 ff., 84 
theories of, 92 ff. 
Space, 38 ff., 97 ff., 312 ff. 
Spaulding, E. G., 133, 138, 143 
Spencer, H., 100f., 25] 
Spiritism, 243 f, 
Stephen, (Mrs.) K., 86 f. 
Stephen, L., 212 f, 
Stoicism, 220 
Strong, C. A., 133, 144 
Structuralism, 289 f, 
Subconscious self, 78, 107, 364 f. 
Subjectivity, 2, 10, 112 ff., 197, 
ZOOS Tee21 Su 2 6740s bO, £- 
334 
Sublime, 191, 206 
Onbstance >on th 6.1, 
Petite ly Las?) 


bot, 


382 


Succession, 56 ff., 151, 277 


Summum  bonum, see Good, 
highest 

Swain, J. W.. 16 

Sympathy. 1 Lo4, ne Love ee 
348 ff., 367 


Synthesis, 55, 60, 107, 163 f., 
170/188) ZOOL tao 
System (6S 2h 2a 
PSU Pid a7 Lobo OG 

LT PMESVLOS 


"Taylor *Avsby Clone Mir. 
Teleological argument, 249 ff., 
254 f. 


Teleology, 69 ff., 197, 201, 203, 
249 ff., 254 £., 291, 345 ff. 


Tests of truth, 74 ff., 79, 116 f., 
LLOQ ye eae: 
Theistic arguments, 
Theology, 14, 17 
Things— 
as meanings, 119 f. 
as modes of activity, 42, 59 f. 
as substances, 56 ff., 155 
as values, 122 f., 170 
Thought— 
activity of, 34. ff.,. 42, 112 
as judgment, 78 f. 
as prejudgmental, 78 
as purposive, 255 
as thinker. 286 
content of, 34 ff. 
its laws practical, 174 
nature of, 42, 107 ff., 
363 
Time, 46 ff., 98 ff., 315 ff., 328 
Titchener, E. B., 194 
Truth— 
esthetic, 198 
as coherence or 
1h6, 152591 90 
as concept, 151 
as ideal, 190 


249 ff. 


WAP 


consilience, 


INDEX 


as pertaining to 
110 f. 

as practical, 111 ff., 116 ff. 

as teleological, 187 f. 

relativity of, 83 f., 186 ff. 


structure, 


tests of, 74 -f., 792716. 
P52: £327 Of 
Turner, J. E., 274 
Unity, ||97 £..) . 202 fie oe 


170,°195,0197 (fer aee 
Z9L (135i eet 
Universals, 9, 73 ff., 
£43,0171;:294 
Universe, 125, 151, 181, 255 ff., 
DA SWRS ar 15.190 0 
Utilitarianism, 217 ff. 


108 ff., 


Validity— 

as value, 178 

copy theory of, 143 f. 

of inference from effect to 
cause, 101 f. 

of philosophy, 19 ff. 

of religious values, 240 ff. 

tests! of), 72 is 


Value— 
xsthetic,. 181, 19108, 270 fe 
324 
as constituting unity, 119 f., 
170 


as implying a self, 279 f. 
as objective, 173, 177 f. 


as reality, 6120 fh. 16a 
171 ff., 368 

cognitive, 181, 184 ff., 270 ff., 
324 


in various theories, 172 f. 

intrinsic and instrumental, 
180 f. 

moral, 181 f., 208 ff., 270 ff., 
324 

of philosophy, 23 ff. 

positive and negative, 


179.4; 


122, 


INDEX 


religious, 182, 238 ff., 324 
variability of, 118, 176 f. 
varieties of, 176, 179 ff. 

Virtue, 230 

Vitalism, 287 

Vogt, K., 35 

Volition, 64 ff., 91, 264, 267 ff., 

326.\358-f., 347; 363 
Volkelt, J., 198 
Voluntarism, 167, 


Ward, J., 167, 308 
Whitehead, A. N., 46 
Will 208,214 £., 220 f,, 264-f., 
Zoro 20; 350.ff,, 54/7, 
“cb fety Poe to on te 
World— 
as common to all, 79 ff., 368 
anmconstruct;).i2 /aft.; 237 f.; 
Wee Seite OG fi, 
POH els roo OS 


383 

as implying a self, 120 ff., 129, 
17 SiN DD wee Ot Zoi. 
365 ff. 

as interpretation of symbols, 
ee EE ah 

as oknowable; > 2/) fs / 2 f., 
106 ff., 254 


as mechanism, 124 ff., 234 f., 
tM do Dh Gale Noid tarts eG Oe Pee EB A pe 


344 f. 

as moral order, 224, 234, 
293.) 206 fo 260,05 24)£., 
367 ff. 

asitealeasorricws 2 tae OAT tes 
163 ff. 

as ouvalien (AZO feel 68. fr. 
VRE eo 68 

external 2 sews ae oc iee 
LEIA HG 68 ff: 

World-view, 5 ff., 20ff., 249, 


PV Aoi WAS Glas IF EON ih 
Woodbridge, F. J. E., 135, 288, 
307 
Wright, H. W., 229 


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BD21.W74 
The self and its world, 


Th 


eol 


er Librar 


ogical Seminary—Spe y 


Princeton 


1 1012 00008 3057 





